News Star newspaper

I won’t ever fight over a girl- Arinze Okonkwo, model and actor

BABATUNDE SULAIMAN

Arinze Okonkwo plays Bobby in the popular television soap, Heaven’s Gate, produced by Zik Zulu Okafor, a respected actor, director and producer. In the television drama created by the late Pastor Eskor Nfon to further propagate the gospel, Bobby is interested in winning the heart of Adaora (Monalisa Chinda). But he needs to deploy all his romantic wits to outplay Kelechi (Fred Amata) who’s also very much love struck. Each of them wants Adaora as his soul mate. The soap highlights the challenges that single girls go through when they are being wooed by several suitors and how they need to seek the face of God to help them take the best decision.
Indeed, as he gave a finer detail about the thematic pre-occupation of the story, you would even be anxious to know if Okonkwo, the fourth child in a family of seven, has ever been entangled in such a contest over a girl in the real life.
Obviously amused, the Anambra State-born actor said, “No, I don’t think so. I have not experienced that before. If I am dating somebody, everybody will know about that girl; and if anybody is trying to chase that girl, he will go away when he hears my name. But if he can fight, then, he can wait. But then, I don’t think it will ever result in a fight because if she’s mine, she will come my way.”
Sure, he may have been dazzling his fans, in the fictional world, with his impressive interpretation of his lover boy role, but what you can’t wait to witness is when he will bid bye to bachelorhood. Okonkwo, a chorister in the Pastor Taiwo Odukoya’s led Fountain of Life Church, Ilupeju, Lagos State, said jocularly, “I am the only person that is not yet married in the family. I am going to get married soon. I’ve been in a relationship for two years now. Well, there are no pressures from my family. Everybody is just relaxing because I am going to do the grand finale.”  
Without doubt, Okonkwo comes across as someone who can win the heart of any lady with his dress sense. He’s a dandy and one who also knows the spirit and letters of colours as well. But how did he acquire his taste for fashionable dresses? It was a conscious effort that has its roots in Bevista, a fashion house owned by fashion wizard, Benny Obaze. And now, the upshot of his three-year course in fashion at Bevista is Jaspido (named after an Italian designer) on Allen Avenue, Ikeja, Lagos State. 
During the encounter with News Star, Okonkwo, a 1999 graduate of Economics from the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State, said he loved people who dress well.  So, he should be excused if you hear him lampoon any man who commits a fashion blunder. Desirous of righting some perceived fashion gaffes that daily assault his sights, he declared, “Some men don’t know how to match colours. There are some colours men are not supposed to wear and there are some that are good for men. A guy, for example, shouldn’t wear a red pair of trousers on a red pair of shoes. Some of the colours that are good for men are harsh, black and navy blue.”
Speaking further, Okonkwo, also a cloth consultant, said, “I give advice to intending grooms on what they can wear, so that they don’t wear check shirts on check trousers. You can only wear a check shirt with a plain tie or a check tie with a plain shirt. You can’t wear a brown belt with black shoes. Your belt and shoes must go together. These are some of the things I have seen a lot of people do.”
In some way, you would expect that he would have probably faced some stiff opposition from some quarters when he chose to learn fashion after obtaining his degree. But Okonkwo, who holds an MBA from the University of Lagos, countered, “I have always wanted to do what I am doing now. When I finished from school, I served in Wema Bank Plc, but I didn’t like the experience. I am not the kind of a person that would sit down in an office from morning till evening. I think it is all related to what I studied in the university.”  And when probed further, he said excitedly, “Oh, if you are not a good economist, you won’t know your demand and supply. I also have to know what diminishing return is all about. I have to know when a customer really appreciates a product for me to get more of it. If I did not study Economics and Business Administration, I would not have been able to do what I am doing well.”
 So far, if you could recognize his ability as an actor and also attest to his entrepreneurship drive, you would still need to check his record as a model in the past 16 years. Yes, over the years, he has strutted his way to a lot of mouth-watering jobs that include Dangote’s Spagethi, MTN, Tomtom and Bank PHB adverts. But the icing on the cake, according to him, was the N20 television commercials.”
Surprisingly, the ebullient model said he had not done any job that might be described as weird or crazy in his long years of modeling career. “When people hear of models or modeling, they always think it only has to do with fashion. But we have fashion models and photographic models. While fashion models are those that go on the runways, photographic models are those that do bill boards and so on. I started as a fashion model and I have done a series of fashion catwalks. Since I started modeling, nobody has come to tell me I should take off my pants.” 
But why won’t he do so? And if he wouldn’t do the weird and the crazy as a model, what business does he have to do on the runway then? Again, you would want to know if he has made enough money as an actor, a model or a singer to turn down such tempting offers.  Well, while he attributed the reason to both his faith and his church, Okonkwo, who came back to acting fully in 2002, said, “I am not into modeling or acting for fame; rather, I am into all of them because of fun. You see, because of what I do in church, I don’t also do cigarette or alcohol adverts.” And just that moment, you would also want to ask him another pertinent question: “As a professed Christian, don’t you kiss in movies?” Not one to be caught off guard, he explained, “Acting is make-belief. The character I am playing, at one time or the other, must have kissed his wife. So, why won’t I kiss the girl I am acting with? I don’t think there is anything wrong in it. Most of the times, it’s not a deep kiss. Actually, after I started, a lot of people went to my pastor, but he told them they were ignorant because it’s just acting. Of course, I am not going to act nude and then the whole Nigeria will see my bums or d--k.”