hough he looks thin and fragile, Denrele Edun (Adenrele Oluwafemi Edun) has a larger than life image in the entertainment industry. In this interview, he speaks on the challenges of finding love amongst other issues…
Where did you grow up?
I was born in Germany (Hamburg) June 13, 1983. My dad is a Yoruba man from Ogun State while my mum is half Indian – her dad is an Indian and her mom is from Mauritius. So I tell people that I am nationality confused. I do not know where I am from. I am the first and only son, I have two sisters – one is 20 and the other is 17. Presently, I am with my dad and grandma. My mum is out of the country. She is in Dublin so we hang out with some of my cousins, who are also crazy like me. I grew up in Germany for the first five years and that was where I got my first modelling job. My dad took me to a photo studio and told me to take pictures and somebody just saw the pictures and said they were lovely and the next thing we knew there were bill boards everywhere in Germany with my picture. My dad was very happy, he didn’t know he was supposed to collect some sort of compensation but by the time somebody told him it was too late to sue. It was a baby milk advert so they gave us about 100 cartons of milk. I came back to Nigeria when I was five, I could not speak a word in English. I went to many primary schools just to polish my English. Later I began to speak English and Yoruba well, then I ended up at the Federal Government College, Ijanikin (the staff school) and later went to St. Gregory College, Ikoyi from there I went to the University of Lagos and now here I am.
Can you share some of your childhood memories with us?
When I was a lot younger I loved music a lot, but the thing is I can’t sing, I have a very terrible voice. I sing off key, off tune and I used to be in the choir. My dad was a DJ in Germany not for serious business, so he had lots of records, so I used to take his headphone and then I will start singing and jumping all over the place. My mom used to overlook it because she was not a Nigerian so she just thinks I like music but my grandmother thought I was mad and she told my dad that I needed to be examined. At that stage I loved fashion. I loved to watch fashion shows and to read magazines. At the age of seven, I was a good reader of the popular Mills & Boons. I love to read. I read any thing that came my way. I loved to style my hair in different patterns, just to make people envy me and in my school I wore the longest socks which was up to my thighs and this even made my schoolmates think I was abnormal. During the period I was in the choir I was singing treble, my voice just broke down and I still don’t know why till today. So, in church I would open my mouth like I was singing but no sound was coming out so people thought I could sing until I messed up when I had an individual performance. But I was a very fantastic dancer. Because of that I used to have a terrible mouth, I was rude and insolent. I felt I could just talk to anybody anyhow, but I am now more cautious. There was a time I begged my dad to buy me a story book (My Book of Bible Story) because everybody in my class had it except me, so he bought me another version that was different from everyone’s own. I was angry and I threw it away. My dad beat me black and blue. Along the line, the mirror in the room broke and cut me on my leg. I refused to talk to him for a week. When he came to pick me up from school I refused to enter his car. I trekked home, which is like trekking from Berger to Ketu so you can imagine how stupid I was to have walked.
There was also a time my parents went out for dinner and left my baby sister with me and she used to cry a lot so I called my friend and told him, he asked me if we had Vodka in the house and told me to give it to her, so I put Vodka in her milk, she slept for two days. In fact, I thought she had died and till date I never told them what happened.
What was your childhood dream and how is it related to what you are doing now?
I always wanted to be an artiste because I loved music a lot, I loved singing to myself, I loved Boney M. I knew all their songs but later I saw that music wasn’t working. In school whenever they asked us what we wanted to be in future I used to wait for one of my classmates, Yemi Dawodu, to talk first. So anything she says I will say too. When she said she wanted to be a lawyer I said I wanted to be a lawyer, later she said she would like to be an air hostess I also said I wanted to be an air host. But everyone kept telling me I would be a good lawyer because I could lie myself out of any situation. I won’t do my homework when they beat everybody they won’t beat me because I will give you an excuse. I would say I had chronic twitch and my teacher would be wondering what that means, at the end of the day they would still have to pardon me. But when I got into secondary school, I didn’t know what happened I just found myself acting ‘Kidivision 101′ on NTA. Though I wasn’t prepared for acting, it just came and I found out that I could cram scripts a lot and very fast. I still wanted to read law but when all my friends were scoring 263 in the Joint Matriculation Examination (JME) I got 209. I was given English Education so I became an aspiring teacher. So, if I leave entertainment, I plan to teach but that is when teaching profession becomes lucrative in Nigeria.
How about your journey into the entertainment industry?
Professional showbiz started for me at the age of 11. When I started acting ‘Kidivision 101,’ my cousin told me about the audition so I went with a couple of friends. When we got there, there were too many people so I started making noise and abusing the other children because they were not from my school. Then the producer came and told me to stop making noise but I told her to go and sit down. She asked me to shut up; I told her to shut up too. Though I did not know she was the producer, she asked me if I knew who I was talking to I told her I was important too. Later she told them to give me the script so that she can see what I can do or maybe it was only noise I could make. But when she saw how I performed she told them to give me a role. Even my cousin that took me there did not get a role. I learnt everybody’s role in the script so anybody that made a mistake I would just shout and correct the person. People started wondering what kind of a child was this. Later on I grew into a major character. I was the first kid they put on TV Guide so I bought all the copies of the magazine and took them to school because I wanted to make them know that I was going to be popular. At that time it was good for me because even on the street when people saw me they became excited.
Adults would give me money but the younger ones would ask me annoying questions like “Are you a boy or a girl?” later I got tired of answering them, so if anyone asked me I would just open my shirt so that they could see my chest. But it was great for me. When I got into the university I did a lot of stage act. I later went into modelling. I modelled for Mon Ami, Dakova, Kesse Jabari and some others. I used to model with the old models then but most of them are married now. Today I do everything apart from singing which I still hope to do
Are you planning to get married soon?
No. I am not thinking of it right now. I think I am more concerned about what I can make out of myself because no woman wants to move into a man’s house when he cannot take care of her. I am still a hustler and I plan to adopt kids because I love kids. Once in awhile I go SOS village. Marriage is about commitment and tolerance. I may consider marriage probably when I am 32. I need someone that we share things in common, someone that we can go to the salon together and not tell me that her friends would start complaining. Most girls I have met tried to change me but I need someone who will take me for who I am. Most of them are just in love with the Denrele they see on TV but when they see me they can’t handle me.
So what do you intend to achieve in the industry?
It is being part of people’s success story. I might not be the richest man in the world but then when I get the respect that I deserve from the people I help it is encouraging.
How true is the rumour that you are gay?
I like controversies so let them say whatever pleases them. But for me good publicity is good publicity, bad publicity is good publicity but no publicity is bad publicity.
If you had the opportunity to turn back the hand of time what would you want to correct?
I wish I could get younger so that I can do more than I did in my time.
What advice do you have for upcoming artistes?
They can be better than me because the industry is not for only one person.
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