Two documentaries premiering at Sundance this weekend are set thousands of miles apart — in Nairobi, Kenya and Texas, respectively – but at the heart of their stories is the same thesis: the importance of libraries to any healthy democracy. And, in each of the film’s most compelling scenes, also a plea: to save them.
Kim Snyder’s “The Librarians” follows a group of librarians, dubbed FReadom Fighters, who have resisted book bans in Texas, Florida, Iowa and beyond. But the urgency of the Sarah Jessica Parker-produced doc is underscored by another film on the lineup: Maia Lekow and Christopher King’s “How to Build a Library,” which follows two Kenyan woman’s mission to restore a public library in the country’s capital, Nairobi.
Wachuka and Shiro are the stars of the 103-minute film, which trails the intrepid pair as they work to transform the city’s formerly whites-only library, founded by British colonizers in 1932, into a cultural hub that reflects the contemporary, youthful, creative metropolis that exists today.
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“I always thought this is the space where a great film could be made,” King tells Variety over Zoom from his home in Nairobi, the night before he and Lekow — his wife and directing partner – fly to Park City for the film’s premiere. “We were just waiting for some kind of vehicle to take us there and give us some kind of dramatic impetus.”
When Wachuka, who they had both met years earlier in shared creative circles, asked them to document she and Shiro’s undertaking to salvage the McMillan Library, King and Lekow realized this was their next movie.
“We knew we needed to film for ourselves after we saw the state of the library and all of these things that were being unearthed as they were going through it,” Lekow says.
Most of the film is shot within the library’s neoclassical building, whose grand facade of granite-clad columns and white marble trapezoidal stairs have held up impressively well since its construction. Inside, however, dust gathers atop untouched books and broken furniture piles up to the ceiling. By the end of the film, they manage to gather enough funds through galas and their wide network of artists, intellectuals, tech developers, architects, writers, creatives and intellectuals to transform the space into, in their words, a “room full of stories, a heritage site, a site of public art and for public memory.”
They call this homegrown army Book Bunk which, by the film’s end, with the support of Nairobi’s Governor Johnson Sakaja, is now in its final renovations on the McMillan Library. Construction is expected to kick off this year.
Below, Lekow and King talk about the process of creating “How to Build a Library” as both professional and life partners, working with the Nairobi government to gain their candid access and what they hope viewers take away from the film about their Kenyan home:
How did this film first come about?
M: We met Shiro and Wachuka much earlier in the film and music spaces. Chris was doing some filming for Wachuka when she was running Kenya’s first contemporary publishing house. And then she mentioned wanting to go into this library and try and renovate it and asked us to do some filming for them. We went in to have a look but then we realized we didn’t actually want to do filming for them. We wanted to do an independent feature documentary after we saw the state of the library and also all of these things that were being unearthed as they were going through it.
C: When I first came to Kenya in 2007, I just gravitated towards what was really an exciting time in Nairobi in the literature space, which was taking off with Kwani, this publishing house, and the poets and all these kinds of critical thinkers. It made Nairobi such an exciting place to be and Wachuka was such a central figure in organizing all of that. I always thought this is the space where a great film could be made. We were just waiting for some kind of vehicle to take us into there and give us some kind of dramatic impetus.
But we also knew the realities of dealing with the bureaucracy, finding money, the creative economy in Nairobi without any infrastructure, and people just trying to make something out of nothing. And [Wachuka and Shiro] were tenacious enough to pull it off, which is the other thing. I think a lot of people had the idea of this library, but they were the only ones that actually had the networks and the energy. So that’s what got us going.
What kind of resistance did you face, if any, from the Nairobi government in getting the access you needed for the film?
M: Even though our government is really bureaucratic, and it really is so hard to be able to penetrate, I do feel that there’s also the individuals in government that also are wanting to help and might be a little bit out of their depth. So both the politicians that we did film – County Executive Council Member for Education Janet Ouko and Governor Sakaja — were both very open to it. When we showed them their bits, I think they were both excited about it. The question now is will they come forward and allow these two women to do what they want to do?
What tangible change do you hope this film helps bring about?
M: Number one is for Wachuka and Shiro to be able to realize their dream of being able to renovate and restore and build the library that I think so many of us here would benefit from. But I also think it will be interesting to train and figure out how we can start having conversations with UK Parliament, and same in the U.S. I think the whole conversation around race and Black Lives Matter and the book banning, of course. So we do feel that through the impact campaign that we’re starting to put together, there will be a lot of education.
C: We see the story hopefully being a blueprint for Kenya and the wider Africa. There’s so many young visionary people with ideas and energy, and they’re coming against systems that aren’t really open to change. And so if the film can just help move the needle and give people that kind of hope and inspiration to bring these types of changes in their own communities, then that’s really what we want. And our outreach and discussions around the film will hopefully help trigger that.
You guys are both professional partners and life partners. What is your work process like, and how do you make sure any stress or tension from the day doesn’t come home with you?
M: Work always comes home with us. Sometimes things get tense but what’s interesting is I think Chris and I have different strengths so when we bring those things together, that’s what allows us to work so well together and to be able to create work that we’re proud of. Of course, like any relationship, there is a balance where you shouldn’t be bringing work home with you, you should be switching off to then be able to have family and home time.
C: Even though I think our three year-old can tell when we’re talking work and if things are getting a bit heated. She’s like ‘Stop it. Stop it, Mummy!’ And we’ll be like, ‘Okay let’s take this back to the edit room.’ But when we’re shooting, Maya’s recording sound and I’m on camera. We’re both just figuring it out together, following our collective kind of gut, which is very similar. I think we have a different skills but creatively, there’s never really any tension as far as what we think is interesting or fascinating. I think we’re pretty close in that respect. It’s just the drudgery of filmmaking when things kind of get tough.
What do you hope people learn about Kenya, and Nairobi specifically, from watching the film?
M: This is one of the very few films that’s a story about urban Nairobi. You don’t really see this, especially in an African context, when you’re seeing films, especially documentaries. That’s exciting and it’s fresh. And the fact that there’s this youthful element, especially with what’s happening here now, with the protests that we’re seeing around government and taxes. So for me, it’s really interesting for people outside just to see Nairobi and to see that it’s a metropolis. Like, this is the creative crew.
And then wider, with what’s happening in the world now politically, even in other states and other places around the world, it’s really timely. How do we all see our future? How do we want to be able to change the future that we want to live in? And for that to be a constructive conversation. Also, the colonial conversation — both from other African countries and other countries that colonize people — to be able to understand and to be able to see their story in it. How does this story resonate with them? And how will this also allow them to see the situation that happened, and is still happening essentially?