DID YOU KNOW THAT: Strika of 'Beasts Of No Nation' Fame Had Acted in A Foreign Production Before Starring in the Neflix Film?

Contrary to popular conception that Strika, real name Emmanuel Nii Adom Quaye who shot to global fame alongside Abraham Attah for his performance in Netflix’s ‘Beasts of No Nation’ film was picked from the streets of Accra without any acting background by the film-makers is totally false—and I only pieced the puzzle together just last night at a boat party at the 69th Cannes Film Festival.
I caught up with German film-maker York-Fabian Raabe who took me to one his many Cannes parties, this time on the sea—and during our chit chat about his upcoming projects, we landed on how great ‘Beasts of No Nation’ did.
And then he mentioned to me that Emmanuel Nii Adom Quaye who played Strika in ‘Beasts of No Nation’ was one of the young boys he used in his short documentary-Children of Sodom, which made it to the Cannes Film Festival two years ago.
I have seen the documentary but somehow, my mind did not fetch Strika out when I saw him in ‘Beasts of No Nation’ until  York-Fabian mentioned it—and then I checked the photos and his name later on. Bingo; it is the same ‘street’ boy from Sodom and Gomorrah.
It does look like, Strika is cut for the big camera—and it’s interesting how two unconnected foreign productions have all found him in Ghana to work with.