Reality TV star and actress Maria Chike Benjamin has opened up on how she abandoned law to pursue her passion for acting, recalling the opposition she initially faced from her father and the challenges that have shaped her journey from an air hostess to reality television and the movie industry.
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Speaking in an interview with THISDAY, Maria said her father had wanted her to become a lawyer, a wish that influenced her decision to study law while in Manchester, United Kingdom. She, however, said she later realised that law was not where her passion lay.
“My dad has been such a great influence in regards to my life and my career. I mean, he always wanted me to be a lawyer back in college days in Manchester, in the United Kingdom. I actually studied law because that’s who my dad wanted me to be,” she said.
“But I didn’t like law and kind of failed some years and went in to do what I actually loved. And he was quite upset, but we squashed things afterwards.”
Maria said she subsequently moved from law into acting and enrolled in a performance school at Sanford University, where she studied acting and scriptwriting.
“He wanted me to be a lawyer, but from law I moved on to acting. I went to a performance school in Sanford University, studying strictly acting and script writing,” she said.
She also recalled spending three months in Los Angeles, United States, pursuing acting opportunities and attending auditions after completing university.
According to her, however, the high cost of living in Los Angeles eventually forced her to return to the United Kingdom after the acting opportunities she sought failed to materialise.
“The high cost of living in LA chased me away and I moved back to the UK. I just went for a short period to get acting jobs and it never really happened for me,” she said.
Maria, who was born to a Nigerian father and an Austrian mother, said her career journey later took her from working as an air hostess with Emerald Airlines to becoming a reality television star before eventually returning to her original passion for acting.
She described self-belief as one of the most important lessons she has learnt since returning to Nigeria in 2021.
“That has to be the biggest lesson ever throughout having moved back to Nigeria since 2021, transitioning from being an air hostess with Emerald Airlines to a reality TV star to now being an actress. I think the biggest lesson ever would be that I have consistently believed in myself,” she said.
Despite having attended acting school and participated in numerous auditions, Maria said her first experience on a professional Nigerian movie set was both exciting and intimidating because the working method differed considerably from what she had been taught abroad.
She criticised the practice of giving actors scripts shortly before filming, saying adequate preparation is crucial for performers to understand and fully embody their characters.
“Abroad or when I was in acting school, they would give you weeks, months, they would give you script ahead of time. But Nigerians, we do things completely different. They give you a script today and they expect you to be on set tomorrow morning,” she said.
According to her, actors sometimes encounter their scripts for the first time when they arrive on set, leaving them focused primarily on memorising lines rather than properly developing their characters.
“Or you are on set, the first time you will see your script, all you’re doing is just quickly learning the script, not even going into character,” she added.
Maria said the experience was particularly challenging because it differed from the acting process she had studied and expected.
“It’s very intimidating in the terms like it wasn’t what I studied, it wasn’t how I perceived acting and it was quite challenging to just come on set and have to quickly just read my script and then they expect you to just be in character straight away,” she said.
She added that receiving scripts weeks in advance would enable actors to immerse themselves more fully in their roles and potentially improve the quality of performances.
“I wish I was given my script weeks in advance to submerge into this character, to own my character, to be that character, to come on set and give a different type of standard acting,” she said.
Although she acknowledged that she has so far appeared in only a few films, Maria expressed hope that Nigeria’s and Africa’s film industries would eventually adopt production practices that give actors more time to prepare adequately for their roles.
“I haven’t been in a lot of movies in this industry or in any industry. I have just been in a few. But I do hope that someday the film industry in Nigeria or Africa would actually change,” she said.
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