Veteran Nollywood actress Joke Silva has shared her
advice on how entertainers and celebrities can keep their marriages
particularly as a result of several incidents of failed marriages in
recent times.
She made this known in an interview with New Telegraph where she talked to Tony Okuyeme about her career, marriage and more.
Joke Silva, who has been married to another veteran actor Olu Jacobs
since 1985, said that there are as many divorce and separation in other
professions as there are in entertainment, adding that the challenge of
the entertainer is knowing how to manage social media.
“There are a lot of challenges that are being faced by artistes of
this particular generation; and one of those challenges is the social
media, which almost doesn’t allow you your life. People of my age, when
we were getting all the attention, and we were feeling like we were the
best thing, things were different. You need all the attention anyway.
For your work to sell, you need that popularity. It goes with the job,
so you need that popularity. But after a while, you also get to learn
that it can be a double-edged sword.
So, it is about managing it, appreciating the audience for
appreciating your work, but also giving yourself that limit to what
aspect of you they can experience.
In this age of reality shows where nothing seems to be off limit, the
new skill that the entertainer has to learn is how much do you give
your audience? More so, because you don’t want to be false; like used to
happen in the early years of Hollywood where they would create this
incredible image, and then it was almost impossible for the performer to
live under that image; and a lot of them used to use all kinds of
medications just to fit a particular image that was being built around
them. Now, we are in the age of social media, so it is learning how to
cope with social media, to do the work that social media does, which is
to get your work out there, to get your face out there. But then limit
that too so that you do have a life; so that you can have some modicum
of emotional privacy.
Those are the challenges that I know that the younger generation
face. Another thing that I do say, though, is that it is because the
younger generation are very popular because of social media, and so,
whatever happens to them becomes news; forgetting that there are as many
divorces, there as many separations in other professions such as
medical, financial, legal among others. Name any profession; there are
so many separations in those as well.
When two people come from, sometimes different backgrounds – and it
is most times from different backgrounds – and whether you come from the
same social strata or not, you are brought up by two totally different
people with values that are slightly different from the way you were
brought up. So, smoothening out the relationship takes a while. I think,
if one has patience, it will go a long way to help.
But at the same time, it will also help if one has older people,
mentors, whose examples you can follow, who are your willing ears, and
good friends. I never believed in all this rubbish where they say that
because you are married now you should stop having friends.
I don’t believe in that. Your friends are a part of who you are. Why
do you have to let go of all your friends simply because you are getting
married. If the friend is not good or is toxic, then get rid of that
friendship. But if it is a good friendship, then please, just because
you are married doesn’t mean that that friendship should end. On both
sides, let their friends now bring in this new person and expand your
friends circle. I think that is important too,” Joke Silva said.
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