André Holland wanted to play a romantic lead. With ‘Love, Brooklyn,’ he made it happen
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PARK CITY, Utah — Welcome to a special Sundance Daily edition of the Wide Shot, a newsletter about the business of entertainment. Sign up here to get it in your inbox.
Good morning! It’s Monday, Jan. 27, and today’s forecast is for clear skies and a high of 33 degrees — a perfect day to close out our fest.
In our final daily newsletter out of Sundance, your bleary-eyed correspondents recommend two new twists on horror, the team behind “Love, Brooklyn” stops by the studio and we preview a panel about political action and documentary filmmaking. And if you can’t get enough of our festival coverage, you can find much more at our landing page. Thanks again for tagging along. Ryan Faughnder will be back with regularly scheduled Wide Shot programming Tuesday.
READ MORE: At Sundance, a film about wildfire recovery stirs raw emotions: ‘Community is the solution’
The movies worth standing in line for
“Together” (Redstone Cinema, 7:30 p.m.)
Distributors were circling in the lobby at last night’s world premiere of “Together,” a juicy body-horror relationship drama co-starring real-life couple Dave Franco and Alison Brie (both wonderfully committed) that certainly gave off enough blood to indicate an imminent sale. A metaphor for codependency that doesn’t quite have the same verve or depth as Coralie Fargeat’s Oscar-nominated “The Substance,” the film does prove beyond a doubt that today’s audiences are happy to roll with painful sex scenes, a scary-looking cutter tool and wince-making ocular violence so long as laughs come in roughly equal measure. The script (by debuting Australian director Michael Shanks) shouldn’t be spoiled so early, but “taking the plunge” and moving out to the country hasn’t been this suggestive in a while, and Franco and Brie embrace a viciousness that should be relatable to all longtime pairs. — Joshua Rothkopf
WATCH: Alison Brie and Dave Franco tell you how to be a successful couple
“Dead Lover” (Egyptian Theatre, Jan. 30; Redstone Cinemas, Feb. 1)
Imagine the world’s most repulsive Disney princess. That’s director and star Grace Glowicki’s unnamed gravedigger, a filthy lonely-heart desperate to find a lover willing to embrace her stink. Astonishingly, girl meets boy — and then tragedy strikes. This gothic lampoon opens with a Mary Shelley quote that foretells the weird science to follow, but each vulgar kink is more unexpected than the last. Giddily low-class and low-budget, this grave-obsessed comedy was shot in its own black box with a minimum of props and actors. Glowicki’s three co-stars play between five to seven roles apiece, transitioning from female to male at the swipe of a greasepaint goatee. The people seated on both sides of me walked out even before a character puked on the camera lens. But I was transfixed by Glowicki’s manic energy. She’s so electric she even zaps herself with lightning. — Amy Nicholson
Movers and shakers from around the fest
Directed by Rachel Abigail Holder in her feature film debut, “Love, Brooklyn” is a warm romantic dramedy set amid the Black creative class of Brooklyn. Premiering as part of the U.S. dramatic competition at Sundance, the film stars André Holland as Roger, a magazine writer procrastinating on a big story as he finds himself unsure whether he wants to be with Casey (Nicole Beharie), who owns a struggling art gallery and is deciding whether to sell the building she inherited, or Nicole (DeWanda Wise), a widow raising a young daughter.
With a sexy sense of ease, the film captures the tension of allowing change into your life, whether that is a relationship, a job or the seeming inevitability of gentrification.
Holder, Holland, Beharie, DeWise, Cassandra Freeman and Roy Wood Jr all sat down at the Los Angeles Times studio in Park City on Sunday to talk about the movie.
The screenplay by Paul Zimmerman wasn’t written for this milieu, but Holder connected to it and made it her own.
“When I read it, I didn’t see white characters. I saw the characters, I saw humans, and I saw myself,” said Holder. “And it happened to be written by a white man who was writing about his 20s.
“And so my idea to cast the cast as Black people, Black characters, Black actors was just my own proclivity in creating art for us,” Holder said. “It wasn’t just about dunking it in chocolate, but being specific about the culture. And so there’s West Indian patois and language and music and food. And so it wasn’t just about making a white script Black, but making a Black script in the specificity of a culture that I love.”
Holland is also a producer on the movie, and from when he first read the screenplay some six years ago he knew he wanted to see this project through.
“When I first read it, I immediately saw myself and I saw my community in it,” said Holland. “It was also an opportunity for me to play a part that at that time I had not yet had a chance to play, and that I wanted to play, a romantic lead. Often in this business, unless somebody has seen you do the thing, they often don’t think you can do the thing.”
Freeman compared the movie to films such as “Love Jones” and “Love & Basketball” for the way it captures a slice of life. Adding to the richness of everyday life portrayed in the film, some of the actors at times wore their own clothes and Freeman allowed her own home to be used for shooting when another location dropped out.
“I think that’s what makes the movie so special is that it’s not a movie of car chases,” Freeman said. “It’s walking into someone else’s life and seeing the textures.”
Freeman added, “The movie’s about two women trying to figure out, do they even want this guy? And how do they want this guy in their life? And I think that’s a very different story now in the culture. The culture isn’t about, ‘I must have a man.’ It’s about being like, ‘How do I fit into a relationship?’ ... Something about that actually feels revolutionary.”
Wood recalled a time when he was on “The Daily Show” and went to Brooklyn to interview older Black people who were selling their brownstones knowing they were contributing to the gentrification of the neighborhood.
“And a lot of them were [between] a rock and a hard place and this third-generation family heirloom, essentially, deciding whether to sell and take the money and leave or stay and fight. But they don’t know what they’re staying for. What is this going to become that they’re choosing to be a part of? And I think this film captures that tone of Brooklyn through the lens of romance instead of real estate and a sense of what’s worth fighting for versus what’s what should you let go of.” — Mark Olsen
WATCH: André Holland and DeWanda Wise on community and getting opportunities to showcase their talent
Where you’ll find us in Park City today
If you find the news coming out of Washington in recent days to be distressing, you might want to check out the Creating Positive Community Actions in Response to Powerful Documentary Films program Monday afternoon. Subject Matter, a nonprofit group, pairs a documentary with a corresponding nonprofit and gives them both grants.
For Sundance, they’ve matched “The Librarians,” a documentary about library workers fighting book bans — particularly works about LGBTQ+ issues and race — with PEN America, a nonprofit focused on the freedom of expression.
“The Librarians” and PEN America will be in conversation and educate attendees on how they can support their local librarians and fight book bans. — Vanessa Franko
The Box at the Ray, 1768 Park Ave., 2:30 p.m.
Inside the L.A. Times Studios
Roy Wood Jr. (Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times) Cassandra Freeman
We know it’s a good day in the L.A. Times Studios when our subjects get into the act. Armed with his phone, Roy Wood Jr. appointed himself the behind-the-scenes documentarian for his castmates in “Love, Brooklyn” as they posed for individual photos. He also gave Cassandra Freeman some direction during her shoot. “You’re trapped. You’re trapped. Oh, no! Which way out?” he called to her as she posed in our set. See more portraits from the studio in our gallery. — Vanessa Franko
WATCH: “Kiss of the Spider Woman” at L.A. Times Talks @ Sundance presented by Chase Sapphire Reserve
WATCH: Simon Rex is who you need if you somehow end up in the wrong country
WATCH: Lucas Hedges and Naomi Ackie were like old friends, even in the bathtub
WATCH: Finn Wolfhard on working with Willem Dafoe and his love for puppets
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