As artificial intelligence continues to find its way into creative industries, theatre scholar and director Uwaoma Nwazue is exploring how the technology can be used alongside live performance rather than in place of it. His experimental production, He Returns,combines theatre, film, special effects, and AI-assisted processes in an effort to engage audiences increasingly shaped by digital media.
In an interview with The Nollywood Reporter, Nwazue says the production grew partly from his experiences in the classroom. According to him, many students now enter theatre departments with prior exposure to artificial intelligence, film production, and digital storytelling tools. That reality, he says, has created pressure on theatre educators to address technologies students are already encountering outside formal training.
“If they come into a department that never teaches them what they are already familiar with, then I don’t feel we are doing them a favour,” he says.
The project was also influenced by broader changes in audience behaviour. Nwazue notes that many viewers regularly consume AI-generated content, films, and other digital media on their mobile devices before attending live performances. Rather than treating those developments as competition, he wanted to examine how some of those experiences could be incorporated into theatre.
“I wanted to bring the experience they usually have on their mobile gadgets into the theatre,” he explains.
For Nwazue, the experiment also served as a research and teaching exercise. He says it introduced students to emerging storytelling methods while encouraging them to explore how technologies such as AI can be used in scripting, editing, and visual design. He adds that interest in film and multimedia production has increased among students in his department as a result.
The production builds on concerns he has held for years about theatre attendance. During his postgraduate studies in 2016 and 2017, he observed growing audience interest in film and screen-based entertainment. He believes artificial intelligence has added another dimension to that shift, widening the gap between what audiences experience on screens and what is often presented on stage.
One of the challenges in He Returns was maintaining continuity between stage and screen performances. Nwazue explains that actors had to adjust their performances depending on whether they were appearing in filmed sequences or live scenes, requiring extensive preparation during pre-production.
Artificial intelligence was used primarily as a research and development tool. Because the story draws on Kanuri and Hausa cultural contexts, Nwazue says AI assisted with gathering background information and organizing ideas. However, he maintains that creative decisions remained under human control.
“AI became a collaborator in my thought process,” he says. “It did not generate what I wanted. I already had my ideas.”
He also encountered challenges with AI-generated materials, including inconsistencies in visual outputs that required repeated revisions. Despite those difficulties, he believes the technology can support creative work when used deliberately and with sufficient oversight.
For Nwazue, the discussion is less about replacing theatre with technology and more about how digital tools can be integrated into existing storytelling practices. He argues that African creators should focus on using emerging technologies to tell their own stories while maintaining cultural context and authorship.