Zimbabwe braces itself for probably the first comedy sitcom ever to come out of Gweru which will take the audiences through the hilarious life of a young working graduate paving his way into an independent life away from his folks.
The comedy, named after one of the local surbubs in Gweru, is titled Nashville Heights and produced by BlackEnd Productions; it is filmed in Gweru’s Central Business District and directed by Victor Nyamayedenga.
Nashville Heights Producer, Tariro December Chingozho said the family sitcom will leave viewers in stitches and begging for more with twists and turns to real life situations which are turned into humor.
“It’s a comical story based on three main characters centered around Jason (played by Darlington ‘Kylex’ Mutasa) a young working guy who moves out of his parents’ house into his own new space, experiencing a new life and getting into the independent world away from his parent’s home.
“But in doing so, in leaving his parents’ house he ventures into a new life where he meets two new friends Vusa (played by Mzwandile ‘Mzwa’ Fuyane) and Chantelle (played by Chenai Makurumure) who are exactly the total opposite of him.
“So every time they meet, there is a comical experience with a lot of giggles and laughs which will leave audience wanting more from these characters,” December said, as he is popularly known.
The journey into Nashville Heights, however, was not an easy one as December says, as it took almost two years to see the light of day thanks to the coming of the Government sponsored ZimDigital programme.
“We started this production late 2016 together with Tinashe (Ikan) Mutepfa as Technical Director and the script was written by a talented lady Hope Masara from Harare who is a very close friend.
“The main idea when we started was to capture the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC) where they offered us a contract and we recorded a pilot episode and then due to financial challenges the production was prolonged and backtracked,” he said.
December says the challenges did not demoralize them as they kept on persisting and rehearsing until the ZimDigital programme was availed in 2017 and ultimately managed to complete the production this past August.
He said producing the film was a learning process for the whole BlackEnd technical crew and cast on the art, performance and technical sides of production with the crew, as he believes, now capable of carrying any production through in future as they have gained the necessary skills, knowledge and confidence.
In his word to the audiences December said “Have an open mind and enjoy the storyline which is a normal story of people’s everyday life and audiences should pick their favorite character who they can easily identify with.
“So we thank the ZimDigital for the incubation programme that they have offered us, their assistance has seen the success of Nashville Heights.”
Line Producer Happymore Muchayira overseeing the production of the sitcom and two other productions under the ZimDigital projects, said Gweru has talent, commitment and considerable content that still need to be captured above the current projects.
“For Gweru what I have discovered is that the talent and passion is available and has been a learning curve for the guys who executed themselves well.
“If we could have more of these programmes which nature talent we will be in the right direction in terms of improving our local television,” Muchayira said
He said Gweru has a lot of content and across all the three productions they all showed commitment as some sacrificed their own personal resources to see the success of the productions on top of what ZimDigital had availed.
“This is a good initiative by Government and it has gone a long way in identifying and uplifting talent. Midlands is one of the areas which were crying that they are not exposed to opportunities and it was good that Government this time decentralized such a programmes to the Provinces,” added Muchayira.
