'Nairobi Half Life' scriptwriter seeks to pen his way back into film world

Before life careered off the script, Charles Matathia was one of the most promising and talented scriptwriters in the local television and film industry.

His star didn’t shine just on the screen, but he was also a writer and editor at Kwani? — the literary network founded by award-winning writer Binyavanga Wainaina. He contributed a story, Some Gikuyu Words, for an anthology titled Njaria’s Tales.

So when a local production company was shopping for a scriptwriter for what would become arguably the most successful Kenyan-made movie, Matathia was an easy choice. He was paired with actress Serah Mwihaki to yarn the script for Nairobi Half Life. The movie opened in 2012 to fawning reviews and would go on to win continental awards.

But as the credits rolled up and blipped off the screen, so did Matathia’s life. In the ensuing years, Matathia, an alumnus of University of Nairobi, where he studied Sociology and Philosophy went to seed, becoming a character in his own film, a tragic figure of Shakespearean heights.

DRUG ADDICTION

He did time at a rehab centre for an undisclosed addiction, and fell out of touch with his peers. In his new, strange world he was still a writer, and walked in town clutching sheets of hand-written stories and musings.

I meet Matathia in Wangige, a farming town in Kabete Sub-County, Kiambu County. A slim man with shifty eyes Matathia, 39, doesn’t look his age.

He is an old man. His speech is peppered with an indiscernible accent half-American, half-something else. He is also evasive and when I probe his past, he waves me on, giving only brief sketches. What is apparent is his zeal when talking about his scripts and optimism of his impending comeback.

“This is my second chapter,” he says. “My material is enough to take me to 2022.”

REWIND 254

There is a stocky man wearing a thick, Rick-Ross beard and dark glasses. He operates a small makeshift jewellery shop in Wangige market. While customers are few and far-between the shops, he doesn’t lack for patronage, only that the clientele is the most unusual you will find anywhere.

They come in as they are, in various states of disrepair and comebacks: grimy, unkempt, incoherent, empty, and they find the man with the big beard and they are home. Many in the motley group are recovering drug addicts, others suffering from mental illness.

For more than four years, Timothy Mbugua, the shop owner has run a non-profit programme — Rewind 254 — that aims at rehabilitating young men living in the peripheries of life; the kind the society would rather keep a distance from. The initiative’s model is basic, yet in a way, holistic.

Mbugua, a trained clinician, provides counselling, basic healthcare, mugs of thick porridge and tough love. Matathia the scriptwriter is one of the people who frequents Mbugua’s stall. During the second interview, I find Matathia halfway through his mug of porridge.

The two have known each other for several years. “I will tell you, when I met Matathia, he was in terrible shape and state of mind,” Mbugua says. “Right now he is almost whole, save for the cigarettes.”

Mbugua’s life is as compelling and unusual as some of his patients. Mbugua, who is in his 40s, was as a young man wrongly diagnosed as schizophrenic, while what ailed him was a bipolar disorder.

“For 15 years I lived with this wrong cloud over me,” he says. “When they finally figured out my illness, I decided to help others. I can relate with the situation some of these people are in.”

STIGMA

Mbugua, who currently serves 87 patients, also provides referrals for patients who require advanced mental healthcare. Wangige town is considered one of the most drug-prone areas in Kiambu.

“It is an epidemic,” says Kefa Manyara, who has lived in Wangige for several years and runs a project named Boy is Born that provides mentorship to at-risk youths. “A bigger problem is the stigma. The society simply isn’t concerned with rehabilitation of recovering addicts and accepting them back into the society," he says.

Late last year, a hope-filled story made its way into the media and went viral on social media. A young woman named Faith Wanja discovered a former schoolmate, Patrick Hinga, who had been felled by drug use to the point of insanity. She took a picture with Hinga and public support helped him into rehab.

Hinga, who initially showed promise, was released from rehab a few months ago. But the sheen didn’t last long. Soon after he returned from rehab, he fell victim to the life he had been rescued from.

“I feel we failed him, the same way we have failed others in the past,” Mbugua offers. “The boy (Hinga) wasn’t accorded sufficient care. We ostracise those who need accommodation than anything else.”

NEW SCRIPTS

Matathia has written three scripts that he says are ready for adaptation into picture. He carries the scripts with him, nursing them, crossing out lines, polishing them. Just like in his life. He says he is on the boomerang, trying to find a place to happen.

He doesn’t have a phone and so people from his writing days have not heard from him in a long time. His former co-writer Mwihaki has tried to find him; she is aware of Matathia’s travails. She heard it from a friend. “I tried to find him,” Mwihaki says. She is willing to support Matathia regain his footing. “He is a brilliant mind, and I enjoyed working with him. I would like to work with him.”

It is evening and Matathia has just downed an extra serving of Mbugua’s porridge. Mbugua looks him over and notices something; Matathia’s hair and beard are growing feral and that is unacceptable.

“What did we agree about the hair?” he asks, his voice fatherly but stern. Matathia stands there and considers the rebuke.

“I will have it trimmed,” he says scratching his chin. “I will have it cut.”

He walks down the road to his parents’ home in Kiawanugu village in the outskirts of Wangige. He has a spring to his step, the walk of someone who has died and lived again and is looking for a place to happen. It says: we have holes in our lives, and we have holes in our hearts, but we carry on.