Johannesburg, South Africa: Monday, August— Acclaimed filmmaker and creative director Keith Benza has brought Zee Nxumalo’s runaway hit single Mamma to life with a visually striking music video that pays homage to South Africa’s golden Sophiatown era.
With Mamma already cementing itself as a viral contender for Song of the Year, Benza leaned into the song’s nostalgic feel to create a cinematic, old-school world that blends timeless South African fashion, storytelling, and atmosphere.
“I don’t know what they laced this song with in studio but every time I listen to it I get a nostalgic feeling,” Benza explained. “That’s why I chose the old-school Sophiatown theme for the music video. You can see it in the styling, production design, and overall look and feel. It’s a homage to one of the golden eras in South African fashion that complements the nostalgia of the song.”
Sophiatown Nostalgia Meets Modern Sound: Keith Benza Directs Mamma Video for Zee Nxumalo
Benza has worked as Zee’s creative director, helping define her rapidly growing visual identity. Their collaboration has already yielded massive success: the Ngisakuthanda visualizer, which he directed, has crossed 32 million views on YouTube and earned a Video of the Year nomination at the Basadi Music Awards.
“At first I had an I told you so moment because this is an idea I’d pushed the whole team to execute,” Benza recalled about Ngisakuthanda. “Not everyone believes in the effectiveness of simplicity. There was more focus on getting social media content done. So naturally when we hit 2 million views within a month I felt good to know we have a good product, but good is sometimes not good enough. 32 million views is great. We have a great product. That feeling is hard to explain.”
Reflecting on his partnership with Nxumalo, Benza highlighted how their differences create magic: “Zee and I have completely different ways of viewing the entertainment space. I lean more into research, figuring out why certain things work and building worlds of stories whereas Zee is current. She IS what works and she IS the story the world has already bought into. So initially we didn’t quite land the most effective collaboration process, but the answer has always been within our differences. Like in this Mamma video, Zee said, ‘Bro, my audience loves a storyline, no need to be overly creative trying to make them guess what story you’re trying to tell.’ I go to the drawing board and deliver a linear narrative that has underlying binaries such as love vs hate or right vs wrong. Essentially, she says the destination and I drive there.”
Zee Nxumalo praised Benza’s vision, saying: “Keith has completely elevated my visual identity. Working with him feels effortless. He always finds a way to bring my ideas to life while adding layers that make the story even stronger. I’m proud to have him by my side as we build this next chapter.”
On the challenges of shooting Mamma, Benza admitted: “Time! We started a little later than scheduled so we were already at a disadvantage and to be honest we were being ambitious shooting all that in one day anyway. But we made it work. As a director in that position you have to make the difficult decisions: what matters the most for the story and what’s just fancy add-ons we can live without. I dropped a few ideas so we could still tell our story.”
For Benza, the process is as collaborative as it is creative. “It’s all about planning, storyboards, shot lists, treatments, then bringing in the right team to bring the vision to life. A stylist, producer, casting director, director of photography… it takes all of them to get to the final product, not just me. My job is to make sure each of those departments play their part in maintaining the same visual language to drive the narrative forward,” he explained.
His reputation as a trusted creative partner extends beyond Nxumalo. Benza has also worked with Grammy Award-winning artist Zakes Bantwini and continues to collaborate with leading South African stars. “The most important part of my job is execution. Leaving my creative fingerprint is always going to happen because of the mere fact that I touched it,” he said. “Of course my visual identity matters too but I always prioritise executing the artist’s vision before thinking of myself. People know though, if I don’t see the artist’s vision or just don’t enjoy what’s going on, I’m probably just not going to do it. It saves us all the time.”
Looking to the future, Benza is clear about his goals: “With Zee, everyone already knows she’s a star. What you can expect is a stronger visual identity to cement her as a superstar forever. We have a short film coming soon and Zee absolutely killed it. We have more brand partnerships and more screen time, which both create more space to strengthen her identity. On my side, I’m working on new designs for my clothing brand, I’m launching a new magazine soon and I have a few short films that I worked on that will be doing some festival runs.”The Mamma music video is now available to watch on YouTube.