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Nǃxau^[1] (also Gǃkau or Gcao Coma^[2]) (c. 16 December 1944^[3] – 1 July 2003) was a Namibian bush farmer and actor who was made famous by his roles in the 1980 movie The Gods Must Be Crazy and its sequels, in which he played the Kalahari Bushman Xixo. The Namibian has called him "Namibia's most famous actor".^[3]

Biography

N!xau was a member of the San tribe, commonly known as Bushmen. He spoke Juǀʼhoan, Otjiherero, and Tswana fluently, as well as some Afrikaans.^[3] He did not know his own exact age,^[2][3] and before his appearance in the films he had little experience of typical "modern" living: he had only ever seen three white people before being cast^[2] and was unaware of the value of paper money, allowing (according to legend) his first earnings for The Gods Must Be Crazy to blow away in the wind.^[2][3] He earned only a few hundred dollars for his work in The Gods Must Be Crazy, but by the time of the first sequel he had obtained enough understanding of money to negotiate a much larger sum to appear again.^[2] He is said to have wasted much of the money because "he did not have the skills to manage his income,"^[3] although he used some of it to build a brick house with running water and electricity for his family.^[2]

In addition to The Gods Must Be Crazy, N!xau starred in a series of sequels: The Gods Must Be Crazy II, Crazy Safari, Crazy Hong Kong and The Gods Must Be Funny in China. After his film career ended, Nǃxau returned to Namibia, where he farmed corn, pumpkins, and beans and kept several head of cattle (but no more than twenty at a time because, according to The Independent, he had difficulty counting higher).^[2] On 1 July 2003, he died from multiple-drug resistant tuberculosis,^[3] while he was hunting guinea fowl. He was buried on July 12 in a semi-traditional ceremony at Tsumkwe, next to the grave of his second wife.^[3]

References

External links

• Nǃxau at the Internet Movie Database
• Nǃxau at Find a Grave