The Zimbabwe Independent
June 5, 2020
“Seeing myself on Netflix, I have to punch myself every day. Like, is that really me?” asked actress Tendaiishe Chitima, star of the first Zimbabwean feature film acquired by the streaming pioneer.
Cook Off premiered on Monday.
Cook Off was shot in 2017, just months before the fall of Zimbabwe’s despotic ex-president Robert Mugabe, whose iron-fisted rule brought the economy to its knees.
The romantic comedy had a meagre starting budget of just US$8 000.“It was not like a luxury shoot where you have your own trailer and you are big on wine,” 29-year-old Chitima said, sparkly eyed as she recalled the experience from her parents’ house in Johannesburg, South Africa. “Everything was very minimalistic. We had to get things right the first time or the second time.”