Why I live like a young man at 59 – Harry Anyanwu

Being an actor has to do with interpreting diverse roles. For Harry Anyanwu, his most challenging role so far is acting as a pastor. He noted that the role seemed difficult for him at the initial stage, but that it eventually taught him how to pray.

“My most challenging movie role was when I had to act as a pastor; it was difficult for me because I didn’t know how to pray and speak in tongues at the time. Interestingly, the role eventually taught me how to pray; and I went back home and taught my wife how to pray. I told her I’d guide her.

The role opened my eyes to see the things I had always taken for granted in life. It is good to know how to pray, but individuals have different styles of praying and I have been improving on that,” he told Saturday Beats.

Anyanwu is one of the few elderly men in Nollywood industry that have been able to sustain a healthy relationship with young entertainers as he is usually seen in the company with young musicians and actors. Asked how he has been able to build such relationships with them over the years, he said “age is just a number”.

Most of my friends are from the younger generation. I will soon be 60 years old but I don’t behave like a 60-year-old-man; life is simple. My children know me very well and they are used to how I behave,” he said.

Some of Anyanwu’s fans assume that he has always been in the industry, as not many people know that he got into the industry about seven years ago.  Asked why it took him so long to discover his passion, Anyanwu who also sings and raps in his leisure time, said he never knew he would be an actor.

I joined Nollywood around 2011/2012 and I have had both good and bad experiences. Nothing has made me derail from being an actor; it is like my last resort after all I have been through in life. I realised that I was predestined to be an actor.

“Before I got into acting, I used to work in a bank. The only constant thing in life is change, I never knew I was going to end up in the entertainment industry, it just happened. My life is much better now than it was before I joined Nollywood.  Even though I read accountancy, I wasn’t sure of what I wanted to do. So when I returned to Nigeria, I was hanging out with politicians with the hope that I would find greener pastures, but it never happened.

After I had an accident in 2010, I was in a coma for about two hours; that was when I made the decision to join Nollywood because I was thinking that what if I had lost my life. I knew it was time to change the game in life. It is not like the journey has been smooth, but I keep pushing,” he said.

He also added that a lot of people had been urging him to go into music. He, however, said he had not given it a thought, stressing that he was in the movie industry for now.