Meet the women of smash-hit Nigerian series Maskers

Victor Okpala’s Maskers, now showing on Showmax, explores greed, friendship, and marriage. The show follows drug lord Austin, who, through his brother Derrick, has managed to set up numerous legit businesses as cover for his illegitimate dealings, including Nitsua Lounge, managed by his wife, Mabel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJdrjhtZWS0

The show is also about Mabel and her friends since university, Eunice and Rachel. Marriage has placed them in different social classes. Mabel belongs to the upper class and is as ostentatious as they come, Eunice’s husband Michael just lost his high-paying job, so they are broke, and Rachel finds herself in the lower class.

Mabel

The pretty wife of a millionaire drug baron who doesn’t work, but loves to splash money. Mabel, like Afrobeat singer Tiwa Savage, didn’t come to this life to suffer. She’s made for life’s sweetest offerings. It is why she berates Rachel for marrying a man who lives on the Mainland (read: far from civilization), and therein lies her problem. Her love for ostentation makes her say unkind things to her friends without her even realising it. But when you meet her, you know she’s a sweet woman who just wants to relax, take care of her girls and be taken care of.

Eunice

Eunice, in many ways, is like Mabel. She is flashy, loves and lives an extravagant life. However, she can’t have the level of extravagance Mabel’s drug-dealing husband provides, at least not any longer. But she fears her friend caustic tongue for the poor, so she lies about her husband’s situation even when Mabel could have helped. To maintain the façade, she eats into their saving with expensive shopping and travels with Mabel while refusing her husband’s appeal to get a job. She’s the fakest of the three friends.

Rachel

Rachel is the least showy of the friends. She is religious, doesn’t smoke or drink; the ideal wife material. But she is always the butt of the jokes when they meet because of her husband’s inability to gift her the kind of life her friends enjoy. When Rachel’s mum falls ill and needs 3 million Naira for treatment, her resolve is tested.

Tonia

Maskers isn’t just about these three friends. There is Tonia, Eunice’s house help. She has only one mission in life, and that’s to win the heart of her madam’s husband. Nothing else matters to her, not Eunice’s harsh treatment nor the couple’s inability to pay her salary. But Tonia’s obsession with Michael is much deeper than infatuation; you will have to watch the show to find out.