“The death of Ada Ameh broke us on The Johnson, and we had to suspend the show.” — Chinedu Ikedieze
On today’s episode on #WithChude would be incomplete without talking about the late Veteran Ada Ameh. She was a great woman and I only met her once. Today, Chinedu Ikedieze talks about how The Johnson family took the news of her passing and why the show had to be suspended for a while.
The conversation goes thus:
CHUDE: And of course, that leads to the question of Ada Ameh.
CHINEDU: Ah! Ada!
CHUDE: You know, yeah, you know I interviewed Ada before she passed and that was one of my… you know people ask me which episode – and this was before she passed, I’m like, it was Ada. It was a raw open-hearted deep conversation.
CHINEDU: Yes! Yes! I know Ada.
CHUDE: So for you, I only met her once but for you, you worked with her for years. What was it like when you heard that she had passed?
CHINEDU: * sighs* Chude it was very hard. You know, she…Ada was like a mother, you know!
CHUDE: Literally
CHINEDU: She took that character off the screen. As in, even outside production. I have met her severally outside, you know, that people will say ‘see your pikin’. You know that kind of a thing. So it was like losing a part of me. It was really… In fact, that was the least story or information or news I opted to hear.
That’s the biggest shock of our lives. That’s all of us…The Johnsons. It broke us…forever.
CHUDE: Charles said when he heard the news, you people actually considered, ‘do we even suspend this production?’
CHINEDU: Yes! Yes!
CHUDE: Seriously, you did?
CHINEDU: Well I thank God that at the end of the day? We were able to calm ourselves down, then thought about the way forward. You know, losing Ada on THe Johnsons, we didn’t even believe that the show would still go on. Because if you mention The Johnsons, you must mention ‘Emuakpor.’ It’s difficult to take away Ada, that is the character Emu from The Johnsons. But I don’t know how it happened…
View this post on Instagram
Head over to HERE to watch the full interview.
You can also listen to the full podcast on HERE
