On X (or Twitter), Femi Dapson’s pinned tweet is a listing of some of the music videos he has produced. It includes videos for Grammy-nominated, record smashing songs like Rema’s Calm Down, as well as other hits from the stables of Burna Boy, Kizz Daniel and Ayra Starr, and more. Since then he has become something of an internet celebrity, growing in followers across social media, while his already-impressive portfolio has continued to expand, most recently encompassing Awuke, Davido’s YG Marley-featuring release. Amongst the many reactions to his career, Dapson often gets conflated with a music video director, whose job it is to ideate the film, which Dapson brings to life. He says he’s working to increase awareness of the role of producers in the film and video world. “It’s an industry that also needs to also be respected. And I’m trying to put the word out there.”
Source: Instagram/femi_dapson
While he now occupies a glamorous position in the industry, his journey to it was anything but. Femi Dapson grew up in uncompleted buildings. His family—two parents, three siblings, and himself—skipped around Lagos taking residences on streets in areas like Agege and Igando. They would put empty sacks over their windows, and spread mats over sandy floors to sleep. It is a story that makes for great telling in the retrospective lens that his newfound status provides. A video he took while cleaning toilets for a living in 2017, that has now gone viral, captures the doggedness with which Dapson worked to escape poverty, and the conviction he held of success.
Now one of the corner pieces of Nigeria’s rapidly growing music industry, Dapson’s motion is constantly pointing onwards. He established Nouvelle Films in 2020, which translates from French to mean “New.” It is a short mission statement of what Dapson intends to add to the industry: fresh concepts and new ways of executing them. It is why he is constantly growing and diversifying his craft, stretching his portfolio to include Nollywood films, commercials, and even event planning and management. In an interview with The Culture Custodian, Femi Dapson shines a light on the inner workings of video production, an undersung, yet critical aspect of Nigeria’s music industry, and how he came to sit at the summit of it.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity
You have an impressive resume of produced music videos. How did you get such an important role in the industry?
I don’t want to say it just happened, but the truth is that it just happened. I just kept working. The more I kept working, the more people noticed the work I did, and how good I was at my job, and the more they reached out to work with me. Whichever director that I work with, they can’t just help but keep recommending me. For instance, I know Edgar (Esteves), and I produced a video for Edgar here in Nigeria, that is Wave by Asake. Now, to anybody who cares to listen, Edgar is going to say “I met this guy in Nigeria, his name is Femi Dapson. He’s the best director ever, he’s this, he’s that.” Now, Edgar did that up until the point where Daps [Nigerian-British director] heard it and then Daps also wanted to do a video in Nigeria. He reached out to me and said “Yo, Femi, Edgar said this.” And now I’ve done a video for Daps, Awuke, and I’m getting DMs of people saying they like it.” The bible says that show me a man diligent in his work, he will stand before kings. So I feel like that’s just what is manifesting in my life.
That’s great because it shows you have a lot of positive references. When you made your viral pinned tweet, a few people conflated video production with video direction. Do you get that often?
What I’m trying to do with the platform that I have right now, is show what music videos producers do. My job is, by natural elements, a behind the scenes kind of job. We don’t really see clout attached to being a producer. Especially in the music video industry. If you look at other aspects of filmmaking, for example, in the movie industry, the producer has more clout. In music, everybody wants to be a director because of the clout I feel is attached to it. But there are so many other things you can be. Set designers, DOP [Director of Photography] and so on. And I’m not the only producer in Nigeria. But, people have just been fortunate to know my name because of the clout around me right now, my tweets blowing up. But there are people that have been producing way before me, people that taught me production. Like Jimi Adesanya taught me production. There’s Ebuka, a great guy, there’s Dawa, a great producer also.
So, what does a music video producer do?
Directors have an idea in their head of what they want the video to look like. And when they come to me as a producer, I try as much as possible to break down that idea in a way that it looks achievable. So I can say “Yo, this one that you’re thinking about, is amazing, but not in Nigeria. Oh, this one is amazing, but not for Rema.” So that’s what producers do. We bring it to life for you. If you give me your treatment, I’ll start reaching out to everybody. I’ll get the cast, the location, the crew and everything for you.
Your latest video is Awuke with Davido. Let’s use it as a case study for the music video production process. Starting with, who reached out to you for the job?
The director, Daps, and David are friends. David reached out to Daps. Daps had an idea for what he wanted to do. He sent the idea to them and they liked the idea. Then he sent me the idea. I took the idea, and I broke down how we would execute it. I gave it back to him. He said it was perfect. Then we started working. I made a budget of how much it would cost, he sent it to the label, he started going back and forth with the label via email. When they agreed on the budget, they sent the money, I started planning. Daps was in Miami at the time. So I went out into the street. I had my location manager get pictures of the location, he sent a bunch of options, I made my picks and sent it to Daps. Before he got into Naija, I sent location, casting, pretty much everything. He got in like 2-3 weeks before the shoot. I had gotten everything ready for him.
So how do you get the casting calls out? How do you get, say, 30 people that can ride bikes (for Awuke)
As a producer I have so many contacts, but it is not just a producer thing. Many people not in the industry do not know that there is a casting manager role. I didn’t need to go get 30 people from the street. I have a casting manager, a casting agency I trust. I called them, that’s all I needed to do. They sent me pictures of the cast, videos of their stunts and all. After I made my own selections, I showed Daps and he agreed. I also didn’t go to the market and buy clothes, I have a stylist for that. I have amazing casting managers and stylists. Though we need more of them, more location managers, casting managers, stylists in the industry.
It’s an industry that works with tight connections and relationships. You need to have everybody on your phone
Yeah, definitely.
How do you keep everybody in the cast and crew quiet about the music videos they’re working on? Especially when the song hasn’t even been announced yet. Do you have NDAs for that?
Yes we have NDAs, and everybody is a professional, so everybody knows what they should not do. For example, the choreographer that worked on Awuke, she had been doing the choreography for almost 2 weeks before we shot the video. So she’s had the song already. But she’s had an NDA and all the dancers and everyone else has signed an NDA so you can’t make recordings, you can’t sing it outside, you can’t talk about it, until it officially drops.
What are some of the common challenges you face while shooting videos? Especially Nigerian challenges? Do you have run-ins with area boys or police extortion?
It happens a lot. It’s Naija, so these are challenges that we expect. For example, I’m taking Davido to Lagos Island to shoot. I’ve paid everybody I can pay. I’ve paid all the area boys. I’ve gone to see the area commander of police to get approval letters. I’ve gotten approvals from LASTMA (Lagos State Traffic Management Agency), the army, there’s no agency I haven’t met. But I know for a fact that despite everything I’ve done, on the day of the shoot, something will come up again no matter what you do. And it happened. When we were shooting Awuke, one guy came from LASTMA’s office and said that he’s the Oga and nobody told him anything about our shoot. That we would have to shut it down. It took almost an hour to sort it out. We knew bringing Davido to Lagos Island would be madness. So we already had cash sorted. And like I predicted, on the day of the shoot, area boys came and said they were not part of the settlement we did. The money we spent that day, to pay people on set, like area boys, was nothing less than 8 million naira. And that’s after everybody we’d settled before. Because I have to put the safety of my artists and my crew members first.
Do these challenges discourage you from shooting videos in Nigeria? What percentage of music videos are shot here?
Most of them are still done here. But right now, our artists are going more international by the day, so we’re beginning to explore other locations also. I just came back from Morocco and I was able to explore locations there. But as of right now most of our stuff is done here in Naija.
I hear a lot about how much it costs to shoot a music video right now in Nigeria. I know you’re probably one of the best people to tell us. What is your rough estimate of the average music video? Nothing too flashy, maybe a club scene and a few extras.
I don’t like to call numbers so I don’t discourage people. It depends on what you’re trying to achieve. Because of the quality of jobs that I try to do, it costs a lot of money. I’ve done videos of $50k, $80k dollars. I’ve done videos for $120k, 150k.
With the work you get, are there ever times when you have clashes in your schedule? When you have two different things to shoot and you have to turn down one?
Yes, but not to turn down one. Now, we’ve been able to build the company to a point where we can simultaneously run four productions in four different countries. I have producers that I’ve trained that can run a production without me going there. When I was in Morocco, they were running a production in Lagos for Zlatan and I wasn’t there. And everything went smoothly. So it’s not a ‘me’ thing anymore, it’s a Nouvelle Films thing. We don’t turn down jobs, we have the workforce, except the budget is not enough.
Asides music video production, what else are you into?
I just finished producing a film for Wale Ojo. I’m about to jump on another film project, we are supposed to start filming in March. But I can’t really say the name of the film right now. I also throw parties, like Lynkup with Jameson on the mainland. I do activations for brands. I did a party recently, Psychosis, last year. I do public speaking also, I go to lectures to speak to students, motivate them, and make them see that if I could make it, they can too.
What advice would you give a person trying to follow your footsteps? What’s the first step to becoming a music video producer?
The first step to getting to where I am right now is to learn about the nature of the job that I do. I have said a lot of it in interviews. So they have to get familiar with what a producer actually does. Then look for a producer to learn from and go on their set, go and learn, gain knowledge. Keep putting in the work and everything will fall in place.
