On BET’s slate is a miniseries on the life of the late Nelson Mandela, which Laurence Fishburne is starring in.
Joining him are actors playing other leaders of the African National Congress — Oliver Tambo (played by Orlando Jones) and Walter Sisulu (played by David Harewood) — who fought alongside Mandela in the multi-racial, multi-national movement that led to the end of apartheid in South Africa.
Kevin Hooks (“Passenger 57,” “Prison Break”) is directing the film as well as serving as Executive Producer.
There has been no announcement of it here in the USA (at least, nothing that I could find; although it doesn’t mean that one doesn’t exist), but I just learned via the South African Times website that South African actress Terry Pheto has been cast as Winnie Mandela.
The actress herself retweeted an article published on another South African news site that announced her attachment.
Apparently the film is currently shooting in Johannesburg, South Africa. The Times interviewed both Laurence Fishburne and Orlando about the project, and in the published article, it’s said that Pheto is playing Winnie in a project that will feature, as they stated, over 6000 local actors who will bring Mandela’s historic story to life.
Pheto’s name should be familiar to readers of this blog; we’ve covered a number of films she’s appeared (or will appear) in, including the upcoming “A United Kingdom” from director Amma Asante, which stars David Oyelowo; as well as Charles Vundla’s 2011 crime-drama “How to Steal 2 Million,” and “Cukold” (which is currently traveling the international film festival circuit); she even appeared in “Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom,” the Idris Elba film, playing Evelyn Mase, Mandela’s first wife, married from 1944 to 1958, and mother of four of his children.
Stateside, Pheto has also appeared in several episodes of the soap opera, “The Bold and the Beautiful.”
Speaking to the Times from the set of the production, Fishburne said that part of his preparation to play Mandela included interacting with people who were close to him, each passing on personal information to Fishburne about the man that Mandela was.
“Preparing for this role was pretty interesting – the good news is that there is so much information about Nelson Mandela and the struggle out there. I relied mostly on meetings that I had in November with Zelda Le Grange and Ahmed Kathrada. These are people who were very close to him and they shared some wonderful things with me,” Laurence said. “Nelson Mandela’s grandson Kweku Mandela is one of the executive producers of the movie, and spending time with him has been incredibly special,” he added.
Executive producers also include Lance Samuels and Daniel Iron.
