Amazon Prime Video have signed Beno Obano’s brand-new documentary highlighting the discussion and perceptions of race and class within the sport, as well as how rugby union should be open to everyone.
The documentary that launched today, features Anthony Watson, Maro Itoje, Biyi Alo, and Ellis Genge. The short form film looks at the growing diversity within rugby union and how the sport can do more to open itself up to players from BAME communities and minority ethnicities.
The 26-year-old gave a description of his creation and commented on what purpose he had in directing the final piece, he said: “The documentary is about how rugby is a great sport, and how it should be accessible to everyone. The sport is accessible to everyone but not everybody plays it, so not everybody knows about it. I feel like this is a good way to try and spread that as well as much as possible.
“I think rugby has traditionally been a sport played and watched by middle-class white people. However, I’ve been able to benefit in so many ways from rugby and I obviously don’t fit that description. With this documentary, I want to change the perception of rugby and expose it to more people by telling the stories of non-traditional rugby players in the hope that those spectating and participating in rugby may slowly begin to grow and diversify.
“The main thing was that I feel everybody wins in this situation. If you spread the sport to less privileged backgrounds, they win because they have a purpose and they earn money from that. Then the game wins because they have more participants, more viewers – I just feel everybody benefits from this. I don’t see who could lose if more people play the sport. So that is what is at the heart of it all.”
Coming to the conclusion of the title - Everybody’s Game – Obano commented on the reasoning behind his documentaries inclusive headline. He said: “Obviously I thought about that name, and it was the first thing that came to my mind and it's crazy that it stuck that long because usually, these things change.
“I just thought that it is a sport for everybody – when you think of the diversity in size of players, I don’t play the same sport as Anthony Watson for example, but we are on the same pitch at the same time.
“I feel like the sport is for everybody in that sense. And then I feel like when we make the game open to all and more people play the game from various different backgrounds, then the game will be everyone’s game because it is built for that.”
