FILMING OF NO 1 LADIES' DETECTIVE AGENCY IN BOTSWANA

This is the first film ever shot in this tiny republic, Botswana, with just 1.6 million inhabitants - and carries huge political significance. Botswana has no film industry or infrastructure and has almost no one has any skills connected with movie-making.
Director Minghella was determined to shoot The No1 Ladies' Detective Agency where McCall Smith set it. 'The book is so much about Botswana,' he says. 'In essence, it's a poem about what's beautiful about the country: its tranquillity, its decency, its sense of community. It's unique.'

Financial advisers saw it differently. It would be easier to shoot the film over the border in South Africa, which has a thriving, established industry with experienced crews. But Botswana's political class realised the film and its story could be an opportunity to present the country in a favourable light to the world. The government put up about a third of the film's £7 million production costs on condition that a third of the cast and crew were locals too.

The film's producers have signed a 10 year lease for the area at the foot of Kgale Hill, Gaborone, where they have built the fictional shopping center where Precious Ramotswe opens her storefront detective agency

Some interesting facts about filming the movie:
This is the first motion picture filmed entirely in Botswana
10ft electrified fences surrounded most sets to protect cast and crew from animal attack

Executive producer Anthony Mingella says the following "Filming The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency in Botswana was an amazing adventure" "The people were marvellous and the landscape, especially in the northern areas of the country, is extraordinary." "Particularly fascinating to me was working and filming in an African country where old and new are currently co-existing, where traditional values have not yet been eroded by the demands and efficiencies and neuroses of the modern. It was a privilege to be working on a film which celebrates what we can learn from Africa and not what we think we can teach it."
Anthony Minghella was an Academy Award-winning English film director, playwright and screenwriter and died on March 18 2008 following surgery complications (The television series will still go ahead, despite the shock death of the director.)

US soul singer Jill Scott stars as Precious Ramotswe in The No.1 Ladies’ Detective Agency. This is what she says about filming in Botswana: ‘It was first my time in Africa, and it was the most amazing three months. What I saw with my eyes, what I heard. The Botswanan people’s attitude and energy towards life. I’m sure it sounds like I’m romanticising Botswana. But I’m being completely honest when I say it was the best thing that’s ever happened to me.’

Amy Moore, producer of the film of Alexander McCall Smith’s best-selling novel
This is what she says about the filming: “It was the happiest set I’ve ever worked on, One of the crew said it was the first film set she’d ever worked on where no one was on a diet! There were many women on the set and there was just something about Botswana that gave a relaxed, happy feel to the whole production. “Everyone seemed to want to help, the government was great, the extras and Batswana crew were super-helpful, there was simply no tension, which is unusual on a film set.“

The country is already gearing up for a tourism spin-off from the film. The Kgale Hill set with Mma Ramotswe’s office is being preserved and will become part of a ‘Ladies Detective Agency tour’. There already has been an influx of tourists asking taxi drivers to take them to JLB Matekoni’s Speedy Motors garage or Mma Ramotswe’s house on Zebra Drive!!

The film has provided work, training and opportunity for hundreds of Batswana.