Wale Ogunyemi

Wale Ogunyemi
Born	12 August 1939 Osun State, Nigeria.
Died	December 2001
Nationality	Nigerian
Ethnicity	Yoruba
Citizenship	Nigerian
Occupation	playwright
Years active	1963–present
Known for	The Lion and the Jewel Kongi's Harvest Sango Langbodo

Wale Ogunyemi, OFR (12 August 1939–December 2001) was a Nigerian veteran seasoned dramatist, film actor, prolific playwright and Yoruba language scholar

Early life

He was born in August 1939 at Igbajo, a city in Osun State, southwestern Nigeria. He attended the University of Ibadan in 1967 for a year course in drama, the same year he was appointed as a research assistant at Ibadan Institute of African Studies where he later retired.

Career

He began his acting career as a seasonal actor with the new western Nigerian television service in the early 1960s. He later worked with professor Wole Soyinka, a Nobel Laureate and became a foundation member of Soyinka Orisun Theatre. His credible performance made him a choice for the role he played as "The bale" in The Lion and the Jewel and Dende in Kongi's Harvest by Nigerian writer, professor Wole Soyinka, a Nobel laureate. He also featured in The Beatification Of Area Boy, a play by Wole Soyinka premiered at the West Yorkshire Playhouse in 1995. He had written and co-scripted several drama before his death in December 2001.

Filmography

• The Lion and the Jewel
• Kongi's Harvest
• Sango (1997)
• The Beatification Of Area Boy
• The Ijaye War (1970)
• Kiriji (1976)
• The Divorce (1975)
• Aare Akogun (1968) and Everyman *Eniyan, published in 1987)
• Langbodo (1979)

Awards

• Member of the Order of the Niger awarded in 1982 by the president of the Federal Republic of Niger
• Majeobaje of Okuku, achieftaincy title conferred on him by his royal highness, the Olokuku of Okukuland