Veteran Nigerian actress and filmmaker Omotola Jalade-Ekeinde has weighed in on the growing trend of actors using dance routines to promote movies, saying she has no issue with it as long as it happens naturally.
Speaking in a recent interview, she emphasized that while she personally enjoys dancing, she would not do it as a marketing requirement, stressing that the problem is not dancing itself but doing it out of obligation rather than enjoyment.
Omotola noted that much of the criticism surrounding dance-driven promotions comes from the pressure actors face to participate. According to her, people prefer to dance because they genuinely want to, not because they are compelled to. “I dance. I love to dance,” she said, adding that promotional moments should feel organic, with cast members simply “having fun” rather than fulfilling a marketing demand.
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The actress further explained that her primary responsibility ends with delivering a strong performance, while promotion and distribution should be handled by professionals. She maintained that when dancing becomes a compulsory strategy to sell a film, “it’s not professional,” adding that actors should focus on promoting their projects through interviews and appearances, leaving advertising and distribution to those whose job it is to handle them.
“I already did the project, You know, I should go around, you know, talk about the project, promote the project, and then let the people whose job are to distribute and do the advertising of the project to do that,” she said
