Entertainment
Gippie's Kingdom Makes a Splash Throughout the Caribbean!
By The Bahamas Weekly News Team
May 10, 2013 - 1:37:29 PM

Season One is being viewed in ten Caribbean jurisdictions this year: Barbados, Trinidad, Cayman, Belize, St. Lucia, Tortola, Anguilla, Grenada, Turks and Caicos, and Jamaica

In The Bahamas’ 40 year history as an independent nation, it had never been done: a televised soap opera written, directed, performed and filmed by Bahamians.  “Gippie’s Kingdom” made history last summer, bringing romance, humor and melodrama into thousands of Bahamian homes. 

The makers of the historic TV series, Ian Strachan and Travon Patton, are at it again, aiming to produce a bigger, bolder second season for the show.  They wrap up major shooting this month.
   
The 8 episodes of Season One featured some stellar performances by actors such as Chigoze Ijeoma who plays Gippie, Matthew Wildgoose (Kirby) and Shirley Taylor (Mama Tilda). The series centered on a violent crime that left Gippie’s son Junior lying in a coma.  Through 8 episodes we get to meet all of Gippie’s children, including Evan, an “outside child” born to Gippie’s former housekeeper.  The story of Evan is particularly interesting as his mother, Estelle is a Haitian immigrant and the series explores the tensions that exist in communities because of ethnic differences.  Season One returns to Bahamian television on May 27th on Cable 12.
For the past six months, Strachan and Patton have been hard at work filming Season Two, which promises all sorts of surprises.  “We pick up certain plot lines where they left off, but we also added about 20 new characters,” says writer/director Ian Strachan. “There was so much to explore where these characters are concerned; so much that was left unresolved.  We ended last season with a cliff hanger and we wanted to keep that intensity.”

Season One is being viewed in ten Caribbean jurisdictions this year: Barbados, Trinidad, Cayman, Belize, St. Lucia, Tortola, Anguilla, Grenada, Turks and Caicos, and Jamaica

Just as they did with the Season One production, actors only received the lines for scenes that they were in, so the plot of Season Two is a closely guarded secret that the cast is as much in the dark about it as the viewing public. 

A night shoot under April's full moon in Nassau, Bahamas. "I wish we could say we planned to shoot on a night when there was a full moon but that was just our good fortune,” said director, Ian Strachan.

“I can tell you that there’s a whole lot going on.  There’s a riot, a political debate, a cat fight, a marriage proposal, a person gets fixed by an obeah man, all sorts of craziness,” says Travon Patton, the show’s 25 year old Director of Photography and Editor.  “The name of the game in Season Two is revenge and everybody’s playing.”

In April the crew was at the shoreline in South Beach, shooting a scene that had onlookers quite puzzled at first.  As the sun set actors stepped into the warm water, some with nap sacks on their heads.  It was time to shoot another scene; a very unique scene.

“We learn in Season One that part of the reason Evan (played by Jackson Petit) is acting up in school is because his uncle Gilbert has been deported,” explains Strachan. “Well, I said, you know what, what if Gilbert (played by Herve Louis) returns, sneaking his way back into the country?  How will that affect Evan?  How will that play out?  And I just had a vision of the men sneaking off a boat in the middle of the night and making it to shore undetected.  No dialogue as such, I just felt the imagery would be dramatic enough.  I wish we could say we planned to shoot on a night when there was a full moon but that was just our good fortune.”

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