Actress Uche Jombo has mourned writer and filmmaker Biyi Bandele who died at age 54.
The Blood Sisters co-director died in Lagos on Sunday, August 7 according to a statement by daughter Temi Bandele made available to Qed.ng on Monday night.
Reacting to the shocking death in an Instagram post on Tuesday, Uche Jombo who starred in Blood Sisters alongside Kate Henshaw, Nancy Isime, Keppy Bassey Ini Dima-Okojie and others, recollected her last conversation with the deceased before his sudden demise, praying that he rests in peace.
“I keep playing back our last conversation! This hurts. Rest in peace uncle B,” she wrote.
Born on October 13, 1967 in Kafanchan, Southern Kaduna to parents from Abeokuta, Ogun State, Bandele was studying dramatic arts at the University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University), Ile Ife, when he won the BBC Playwriting Competition, and thereafter relocated to England where he had a flourishing career as a writer.
His earlier works include Half of a Yellow Sun adapted from Chimamanda Adichie’s novel of the same title and Fifty another EbonyLife production.
He was also a director of the TV series SHUGA: What’s Your Reality; FELA – Father of Afrobeat, a TV special documentary for the BBC, and his self-produced TV documentary Africa States of Independence.
His latest work Elesin Oba, the King’s Horseman, a Netflix Original movie by EbonyLife Films, adapted from Wole Soyinka’s classic drama Death & The King’s Horseman, is scheduled for screening at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) in September.
His novels include The Man Who Came in from the Back of Beyond, The Street and Burma Boy.
Bandele is survived by his son Korede and daughter Temi.
