Russell Hornsby On 'Proven Innocent' And Playing Characters With Depth: 'I Don’t Want To Be The Actor Who Just Entertains'

The American judicial system is broken. Its foundation has never been sustainable, and as a result, people often fall through the cracks and are left to waste away in prison cells. Luckily, as technology has advanced, justice groups have been able to use new forms of evidence to get convictions overturned, setting some who have been wrongfully convicted free.

In the new Fox drama, Proven Innocent, Empire co-creator Danny Strong, along with David Elliot and Stacy Greenberg, explore the lives of the wrongfully convicted, and how the stain of conviction can never truly be washed away.

Set in Chicago, Proven Innocent follows Madeline Scott (Rachelle Lefevre) a defense attorney who, as a teen, was convicted along with her brother of murdering her best friend, Rosemary Lynch. After spending ten years in prison before eventually getting her conviction overturned, Madeline went to law school before returning to Chicago to open the Injustice Defense Group with her law partner Ezekiel ‘Easy’ Boudreau (Russell Hornsby), communications director Violet Bell (Nikki M. James) and private investigator Bodie Quick (Vincent Kartheiser). Though she’s eager to help free innocent people, Madeline is also determined to take down the man who put her in jail, corrupt powerhouse prosecutor Gore Bellows (Kelsey Grammer), while uncovering what really happened to Rosemary.

Ahead of the show’s premiere, Shadow and Act flew to Chicago to visit the Proven Innocent set. We sat down with Russell Hornsby to discuss the series, why he was hooked from the first script and why certain roles are suddenly falling in his lap.

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Exclusive: Noble Jones On Centering His Directorial Debut ‘The Tomorrow Man’

Not many of us are called to stories that center the Midwest, but for writer-director Noble Jones, who is a native New Yorker, there has always been something beautiful about small-town America.

In his debut feature, The Tomorrow Man, Jones explores aging, love and the fear of what’s next. Starring John Lithgow and Blythe Danner as two older people who clutch on to one another in the midst of apocalyptic trepidation, The Tomorrow Man is a whimsical look at companionship and what it means to face death.

Ahead of the film’s premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, The Knockturnal sat down to chat with Jones about The Tomorrow Man, getting Lithgow and Danner together on screen, and why this is a film for today. 

“I’m not quite sure why it ends up being about an older couple,” Jones reflected on his characters Ed (Lithgow) and  Ronnie (Danner). “Much of this process is likes a séance, where the character shows up. I have a habit of just creating characters and then ripping for a while. In this case, I just thought it was interesting. I’m a fan of John Ford films and the west. I was watching all of these Ken Burns documentaries, specifically, The West. I put it on a loop.”

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'Siempre Bruja' Clings To A Tired Slave Master/ Slave "Love" Story, Crippling the Show’s Magic

Time can mean everything and nothing at all depending on your circumstances. For incarcerated people —specifically those on Death row, and prison employees responsible for ending lives, time is all-consuming. In her masterfully haunting drama, Clemency —director Chinonye Chukwu examines the lives of Bernadine Williams (Alfre Woodard)— a prison warden, and Anthony Woods (Aldis Hodge) — a man on death row. Though Bernadine has worked tirelessly to maintain an emotional masque —one that has allowed her to direct the execution of 12 incarcerated men —her facade is beginning to crack.

With his death warrant signed —Bernadine finds herself drawn to Anthony, a man grasping on to the very last fragments of his sanity as death hovers around him. Just after Clemency's premiere at Sundance Film Festival, and before it won the U.S. Dramatic Grand Jury Prize, Shadow and Act sat down with Chukwu to discuss the unnerving story, and why she was inspired to write it in the first place.

"I was really inspired to tell the story the morning after Troy Davis was executed," Chukwu remembered. "Troy Davis was executed in September 2011, and hundreds of thousands of people protested against his execution, including some retired wardens and directors of corrections. They all banded together and wrote a letter to the governor appealing for clemency, not just on the grounds of potential innocence, but also because of the emotional and psychological consequences they knew that killing Troy would have on the prison staff who were sanctioned to do so."

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Acclaimed Filmmaker Stanley Nelson Talks Getting Into Miles Davis' Head With 'Miles Davis: Birth Of Cool' [Sundance Interview]

If we’re lucky, many of us may have the fortune of doing one extraordinary thing in a lifetime. The late legend Miles Davis had the luck of ten men. The world-renowned trumpet player had an exemplary career that spanned five decades. Though he was temperamental and sometimes vicious, the only time Davis allowed himself to be vulnerable was when he was creating and playing his music. A chameleon who was able to shift and change with the times without ever losing the essence of who he was, Davis lived quite a life. In his brilliant documentary, Miles Davis: Birth of Cool, acclaimed filmmaker Stanley Nelson gives his audience a window into Davis’ life —one that showcases his triumphs and his demons.

The film, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, is comprised of archival footage, studio outtakes, and rare photos. More than that, the documentary is from Davis’ own perspective, with words from his autobiography, Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool. Nelson also conducted interviews from those closest to Davis, including his family, friends, and contemporaries. Just after the film’s premiere, Shadow and Act sat down with Nelson to discuss his long journey to complete the film, and the tension that came with tackling such a massive icon.

"We started almost fifteen years ago with American Masters," Nelson remembered. "We got permission from the family, and then from Sony Music. Then somehow, some way, the project kind of fell apart and just got scuttled. Then maybe two years ago it got resurrected, so we've been working on it a solid two years now.”

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'Little Monsters' Is A Bloody Vulgar Delight [Sundance Review]

There is a great divide when it comes to children. While many people view the pint-sized humans as adorable balls of energy, full of spark and shine, others view kids as terrifying, tiny creatures who wreak havoc on the already complicated lives of adults. Abe Forsythe’s absurdly brilliant Little Monsters is about two people who see children from different sides of the coin. However, they are forced to come together to protect a group of Kindergarteners from some very real monsters.

Set in Australia, the film follows Dave (Alexander England) —an outrageous man-child whom after a decade-long relationship is nursing a broken heart and a long-expired dream of being a rock star while sleeping on his big sister's (Nadia Townsend) couch. Unfortunately, Dave’s adult hiatus is interrupted by the presence of his precocious 5-year-old, nephew Felix (Diesel La Torraca). Adorably innocent and allergic to nearly everything under the sun, Felix is delighted by his Uncle Dave. Slipping out from under the watchful eye of his doting but ultra-protective mother, Felix becomes privy to Dave’s constant vulgarity and horrifically violent video games.

One day after dropping Felix at school, Dave becomes enamored with the little boy’s stunning and charming Kindergarten teacher Miss Caroline (Lupita Nyong’o). Determined to get to know her better, Dave finds himself volunteering to chaperone a field trip to Pleasant Valley Farm petting zoo. What begins as a routine excursion transforms into a horrifying, bloody zombie Apocalypse with Dave, Miss Caroline and the kids trapped in the midst of it.

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A Powerful and Cunning Black Girl Stands At the Center Of 'Selah and the Spades' [Sundance Review]

High school can be a very polarizing time. It’s comprised of four years that seem to mean everything while you’re in the midst of them, but nothing at all when you’re reflecting on them in your rearview. Cinema has no shortage of high school depictions—specifically when it comes to analyzing the “mean girl” in film. From Carrie to Cruel Intentions — and of course Mean Girls, there have been plenty of depictions of the vicious popular girl, but there has been nothing quite like director Tayarisha Poe’s debut feature, Selah and the Spades.

Set in rural Pennsylvania on the picturesque grounds of the elite Haldwell boarding school, we meet Selah (Greenleaf's Lovie Simone) —a leader of one of the five factions run by members of the student body. Tarit runs The C, a group made of teacher’s pets gone rogue; Amber runs The Skins who deal with anything that can be gambled on --football in the fall, basketball in the winter and softball every spring.  The Bobbys are run by Bobby, and they handle all of the illegal parties on campus. Two Tom, the head of the prefects, keeps the administration at bay. Then, there are the Spades, run by Selah and her best friend Maxxi (Moonlight actor- Jharrel Jerome), who deal in the most coveted of vices, illegal alcohol and pills. The number one rule that all of the factions abide by is no snitching.

Since drawing up a peace treaty their sophomore year, the factions have worked harmoniously together, outwitting The Heads (Headmaster Banton is portrayed by Jesse Williams) and essentially keeping order in the school. However, in the Spring semester of their senior year, the faction heads are at each other's throats and Selah and her secrets are at the root of this turmoil.

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Chiwetel Ejiofor Talks 'The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind' and Authenticity At Sundance

For decades, BAFTA-winning actor Chiwetel Ejiofor has stunned on the stage and the big screen. With roles in films like 12 Years A Slave and Come Sunday, the Nigerian-English actor never seriously considered stepping on the other side of the camera. That quickly changed when he heard William Kamkwamba’s astounding story. Though he was just a boy in rural Malawi when famine struck his village in the early 2000s, William ingeniously built a windmill pump to bring water to the parched lands, saving his family's life.

Invigorated by Kamkwamba’s autobiography, The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, Ejiofor would embark on a decade-long journey that would unleash Kamkwamba's magnificent life onto the big screen and set the stage for his own directorial debut. Shadow and Act was present during a conversation at MACRO Lodge at Sundance Film Festival where Ejiofor sat down to chat with producer Adetoro Makinde about The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, his journey to bring it to the big screen, and why stories like these need a platform.

"The book came out in 2009," Ejiofor recalled. “A friend of mine was at the launch party for the book and told me about it then. I read it, and I was transported by William Kamkwamba's journey, his ingenuity, his attitude, his way of being, his thought process, his dynamism. There was this sense of humility and depth and intelligence and warmth and understanding of the wider geopolitical situation that was being described."

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'Pahokee' Has A Levity and Warmth Often Lost In Documentaries Depicting Black Rural Life [Sundance Review]

For years, inner city Black life has been a focus in cinema in both the narrative and documentary sectors. Movies like Menace II Society and Hoop Dreams were marketed as the sole depictions of the African American experience. However, in recent years—particularly in documentaries like the Oscar-nominated Hale County, This Morning, This Evening —there have been numerous illustrations of rural Black life. With their film Pahokee— directors Ivete Lucas and Patrick Bresnan join a new class filmmakers including RaMell Ross, Amman Abbasi, and Margaret Byrn in examining present-day Black life in some of the country’s most rural areas.

Located on the shore of Lake Okeechobee in Palm Beach County, Florida and boasting a population of just under 6,000 people Lucas and Bresnan turn their lens on the town of Pahokee. The audience is given a front row seat as the tiny, close-knit community experiences the highs and lows of the 2016-2017 school year. Out of a class of 103 seniors at the Pahokee Middle-High School, Pahokee follows four students, Na’Kerria Nelson, Jocabed Martinez, BJ Crawford and Junior Wallace who are all navigating their way through their final days of adolescence.

Unlike many documentary films that examine impoverished people of color like Phantom Cowboys or Quest, Pahokee does not peel back the layers of the students' personal lives. Instead, the documentary centers the high school, its numerous extracurricular activities, and the frenzy of Homecoming, the Football State Championship, college acceptance, signing day and graduation.

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'Premature' Is A Gripping Account Of A Young Black Woman's Sexual Awakening [Sundance Review]

There is a sort of magic that occurs in those three wistful months just after high school graduation. It’s that short wrinkle in time before we leap eagerly into adulthood, whether heading to college or into some other adventure that will lead us into the next chapter of our lives. In mainstream films, this time is often romanticized. We’ve watched countless movies like Lady Bird, and The Perks of Being a Wallflower as the protagonists get swept up in the wonder of what’s next, and the familiar pain of what will be left behind. Rarely are Black faces at the center of these narratives.

With their rich and thoughtful romantic drama Premature, director Rashaad Ernesto Green and writer/star Zora Howard give us a Black love story set over the course of one summer. It is a narrative filled with lust, love, pain and the desperate hope of youth. Howard stars as Ayanna —a 17-year old Harlem native who spends those last hot New York summer days before college with her girlfriends at the park, and at various late night kickbacks. All set to attend an upstate New York college in the fall, the bold, no-nonsense writer finds herself enamored with Isaiah (Joshua Boone) —a slightly older New York transplant trying to carve out space for himself in the music industry.

From the moment we meet Ayanna on a stuffy subway car with her homegirls, she stands out. Brash and confident, she is as equally intuned with herself as she is with her clique. Quiet at first, she writes furiously in a notebook that never leaves her side. And yet, when prompted, she easily slips into the familiar camaraderie of her girls and their interactions with the young men of the city who are ceaseless with their advances.

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'Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am' Presents A Personal Perspective Of A Miraculous Life [Sundance Review]

If we do not tell our own stories, someone else will paint a picture of our lives and call it the truth. Prolific writer and Nobel Peace Prize winner Toni Morrison has been writing her story and chronicling the lives of Black folk for nearly 50 years. Though her work is world renowned, her personal history and life’s journey has remained somewhat mysterious.

In director Timothy Greenfield-Sanders intimate documentary Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am, the audience is taken on a journey through the Beloved author’s life, from her humble beginnings in Lorain, Ohio, to her days as an editor at Random House and then as a lecturer at Princeton University. Using Morrison’s own recollections along with anecdotes from her childhood and earlier years, the author and Greenfield-Sanders construct a picture of a woman who single-handedly reshaped literature not just for Black folks, but for lovers of language and the written word across the globe.

Toni Morrison’s life did not begin with her birth in 1931. Instead, The Pieces I Am stretches backward —two generations before Morrison — to her grandfather, who would proudly boast to anyone listening that he’d read the Bible from cover to cover five times. Literacy has never been a given for members of the Black community which is why for Morrison — who learned to read at age three— books have always been somewhat of a miracle.

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Nikyatu Jusu On Her Evocative Black Vampire Film 'Suicide By Sunlight' [Sundance Interview]

Cinema has a long history of exploring supernatural themes like vampirism and witchcraft. Despite our centuries-long curiosity with the undead, there has been almost no examination of how African folklore and legends fit into these film narratives. With her hypnotic and astonishingly filmed short, Suicide By Sunlight, Sierra Leonean American filmmaker Nikyatu Jusu turns the spotlight on a Black female vampire.

A pediatric nurse, Valentina (portrayed by Natalie Paul) is also a day-walking vampire who is protected from the sun by her melanin. Though she wants to make a difference at work, Valentina’s personal life is in disarray. Devastated by her estrangement from her twin daughters, Valentina struggles every single day to curb her bloodlust. Ahead of her two sold-out screenings at the Sundance Film Festival, Shadow and Act sat down to speak with Jusu about Suicide By Sunlight, how Octavia Butler invigorated her and why she made this film almost on accident.

"I stumbled across Octavia Butler’s work many years ago, and I discovered Fledgling," Jusu explained. "The story was really compelling, but I knew I needed to do more research about melanin because I love when genre melds scientific fact with fantasy. The idea of Black vampires walking in the sun is such a springboard for so many ideas, and I wanted to explore that."

Melanin and how it fits in with fantasy was something that the New York University’s Tisch Graduate Film school alum could not shake. "I was thinking about miscegenation, our history as Black people, and passing," she revealed. "All those layers are inherent in the concept of Black day-walking vampires. Then it was about researching the origin of vampires in our respective cultures. I was validated when I discovered that there were African vampires, grounded in Ghanaian culture. There are Haitian vampires called Loogaroos grounded in that culture. So melding all of that with the springboard of Octavia Butler—it's just so rich with so much story. The hook is day-walking Black vampires, but you still need the story."

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T.C. Carson Talks 'Last Call,' Telling REAL Black Stories and Those 'Living Single' Reboot Rumors

T.C. Carson stormed into our lives as the charismatic and debonair Kyle Barker on the hit ‘90s sitcom, Living Single. The series, which focused on six single carefree friends living and loving in Brooklyn, ushered in a slew of other TV shows including Friends, Girlfriends, and Moesha. Since leaving Living Single in 1998, Carson has voiced the character Mace Windu on Star Wars: The Clone Wars and he's appeared in countless films and TV shows. Now the Chicago native has returned to television full time in Bounce TV's new series, Last Call.

Called the Black Cheers —Last Call follows ex-NFL player, Darius Knight (Malik Whitfield) who is forced to rent out the backroom in his bar as a comedy club after running into some financial issues. On the series, Carson stars as Arthur Payne —a widower and retired veteran who loves spending his golden years trading barbs with all of Last Call’s regulars. Recently, Shadow and Act sat down with Carson to talk about the new series, if he’d ever do a Living Single reboot and why he’s nowhere near done telling Black stories on the screen and stage.

"Last Call is loosely based around that same idea as Cheers which is great,” Carson revealed. "But really what got me to the project was the director, Roger Bobb. He asked me to do it so I did it."

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Black at Sundance: 9 Survival Tips For First-Timers

For cinephiles, industry folks and aspiring industry folks, film festivals provide opportunities to network, rub shoulders with some of Hollywood's A-listers, and screen indie films before studios snap them up and distribute them in theaters.

The Sundance Film Festival is one of the biggest film festivals in North America, so if you’re going to visit just one fest each year, we suggest you make the trek to Park City, Utah to "dance in the Sun." Founded in 1985 by Robert Redford, the winter film fest gets bigger each year with screenings, panel discussions, events, and parties.

Navigating through Sundance can be an overwhelming experience —especially for first-timers. And considering that there are only 50,000 Black people in the whole state of Utah, it can be difficult to meet and connect with other Black creatives on the Mountain. Here are some Sundance tips to make your experience as productive and enjoyable as possible.

1) Join Sundance’s mailing list

If you’re not sure where to begin, we suggest joining Sundance’s mailing list. This way you can get alerts about dates, when to schedule your travel, book lodging and when tickets go on sale.

2) Get your lodging situated first

Sundance is EXPENSIVE. But the festival dates for the following year are announced almost as soon as the festival ends. If you plan on going, it’s wise to lock in your lodging as soon as possible. Though it’s possible (and more affordable) to stay in Salt Lake City, which is a 40-minute drive to Park City, getting as close to the festival and Park City’s Main Street is ideal.

If you stay in Salt Lake City, you're going to either have to rent a car or pay for transportation to get up to the mountain every day, so be sure to budget for transportation.

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'Black-ish' Co-Showrunner Kenny Smith and Writer Peter Saji Tackle Colorism In "Black Like Us"

Since the sitcom first aired in 2014, ABC’s Black-ish has been unapologetically examining what it means to be B;ack in America today.The show stars Anthony Anderson and Tracee Ellis Ross, as Dre and Rainbow Johnson, upper-class Black Angelenos raising their five children.  With episodes that explored slavery—like the famous "Juneteenth" episode from Season 4 and the Season 3 episode “Lemons,” which centered around the abysmal 2016 election and its results, Black-ish has never shied away from the topics that sting us to our core.

In the upcoming episode, "Black Like Us," the series is tacking another topic that society and the Black community has been wrestling with for generations—colorism.

In the episode, Dre and Bow are disgusted when they discover that their youngest daughter Diane (Marsai Marin) was not correctly lit in her class photo. Though Bow and Dre want to address the school with their grievances, Diane wants to let it all blow over, resulting in a heart-wrenching dialogue about colorism among the Johnson clan.

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Barry Jenkins and Ta-Nehisi Coates Reflect On 'If Beale Street Could Talk'

What does it mean to be born Black in America? In the 20th century, writer and cultural critic James Baldwin examined this question through his words and experiences. Today, journalist Ta-Nehisi Coates is grappling with the very same subject. While Baldwin and Coates have managed to articulate the beauty and pain of being Black men in this country —Academy Award-winning director Barry Jenkins has succeeded in depicting the majesty and fullness of Black life on screen. In his latest work —an adaptation of James Baldwin’s 1974 novel If Beale Street Could Talk, Jenkins explores trauma, family, love, and survival in 1970s Harlem, a microcosm of Black America, that still powerfully resonates today. After all, the souls of Black folk still whisper to each other across generations; the specifics of our stories may differ, but the experiences are the same. Jenkins opens his film with Baldwin's quote, "Every Black person born in America was born on Beale Street, born in the Black neighborhood of some American city, whether in Jackson, Mississippi, or in Harlem, New York. Beale Street is our legacy."

Shadow And Act attended the Baltimore premiere of If Beale Street Could Talk, where Jenkins sat down to chat with Ta-Nehisi Coates —a Baltimore native, and the man he says inspired him to tell this story.

"I’ve never seen anybody shoot Black people the way Barry shoots Black people," Coates marveled. "There's a kind of lushness, a beauty that he bestows on Black people, that we are really not used to seeing."

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'Black-ish' Star Marsai Martin And Mega-Producer Will Packer On The Melanated Magic Of 'Little'

Marsai Martin’s portrayal of the precocious and witty Diane Johnson on ABC's Black-ish has been brilliant since she premiered on the show in 2014. However, Martin has had her sights set on the big screen since the beginning. The Texas native was just ten years old when she approached Black-ish creator Kenya Barris and Hollywood mega-producer Will Packer with an idea for her very own film — the body-swap comedy, Little.

"It was me, mommy, and daddy, we were actually talking about the movies that they're watching back in the day,” she explained to Shadow and Act during a visit to the Little set on a hot day in July 2018. "One of my mom's favorite movies growing up was Big. That's where it all started and then we just started brainstorming and thinking about how it could be turned into a Black Girl Magic-type of situation."

Will Packer remembered that meeting and what compelled him to back the film and subsequently pitch it to Universal. "It’s crazy, what were we doing when we were ten years old?!" the Night School producer said. "I could see the movie even back then. It’s interesting because it’s Hollywood, it takes time to get a movie going, and because she is on Black-ish we could only shoot during her hiatus which is a certain time every year. She pitched it when she was ten, so we tried to get it ready to hit her hiatus when she was 11, but the script wasn’t ready. We tried again when she was 12, but the actors we wanted —their availabilities didn’t line up. Then I was like 'Yo! This is the last chance, she’s going to get too old and the movie won’t work.' Fortunately, we got it done just in time and I’m glad because as a teen, she’s able to embody the character differently. It’s funnier now — it’s edgier."

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Photo Credit: Eli Joshua Ade/Universal Pictures

Photo Credit: Eli Joshua Ade/Universal Pictures

On Set With 'Little': Regina Hall and Issa Rae On the Power Of Black Women

Black girlhood is often overlooked— not only in mainstream films but also in the archive of Black Cinema across the diaspora. Now, with the new movie Little — helmed by Tina Brown and starring Black-ish's Marsai Martin, Regina Hall, and Issa Rae, Black girls are being brought to the forefront of mainstream cinema.

Set in the present day, Little follows Jordan Sanders (Hall) a ballsy no-nonsense businesswoman in the tech space. On the eve of the most significant presentation of her career, Jordan wakes up in her penthouse apartment as her 13-year-old self (Martin) Forced to rely on April (Rae) her long-suffering assistant to keep her secret and her business up and running, Jordan must confront some tough truths about her present and her past.

Last July on a sticky hot day in Atlanta —Shadow and Act got the opportunity to visit the Little set. As the soundstage door opened, we found ourselves in Jordan’s office, a brightly lit space that had the CEO’s face and presence all over it. As filming continued on set, we chatted with Regina Hall and Issa Rae about working with Martin, Black women's stories and what it means to be the H.B.I.C.

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Trevor Jackson On The Growth And Glow-Up Of 'Grown-ish' Season 2

Grown-ish, Zoey Johnson (Yara Shahidi) and her misfit group of friends are back for their sophomore year. In the first season of Freeform's critically acclaimed spin-off of the hit ABC sitcom Black-ish, Grown-ish explored what it means to be a member of Generation Z navigating the higher education system along with the joys and perils of adulthood. Since Zoey first set foot on the Cal U campus, she set her sites on the deliciously handsome Aaron (Trevor Jackson), a Black Lives Matter activist and outspoken sophomore whose passion and unwillingness to be silenced (and ability to pull off a rat tail unironically) made the stylish popular girl's heart flutter. Though Aaron and Zoey lived in a bubble of sexual tension and admiration for each other for much of Grown-ish’s freshman season— in the end, Zoey fell for Luca (Luka Sabbath) — a laid-back artist who matched Zoey’s fashion sense and curbed her desire to be the center of attention. 

With a new school year on the horizon — and the second season of Grown-ish debuting tonight, Shadow and Act sat down with Trevor Jackson about his explosive 2018, where Aaron and Zoey stand now, and what we can expect from the series this season. 

"Everything’s changed," Jackson said of the sophomore season of Grown-ish. "I think the characters are like a big family now trying to figure out all their shit. Should they be more comfortable now, or a closer family? Maybe. Aaron is sorting his shit out. Luca and Zoey are together. Everybody is just trying to find their rhythm, and I'm very, very excited for it." 

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Shrouded In Darkness: The Trailer For Jordan Peele's 'Us' Redefines Horror Mythology

"It’s important to note that Us — unlike Get Out is not about race," director Jordan Peele explained to Shadow and Act at an Us trailer-viewing presentation in New York City last week. "It is a horror film. I dedicated a lot of myself to creating new horror mythology and new monsters. I think that monsters and stories about monsters are one of our best ways of getting at deeper truths and facing our fears in society. It was very important to me to have a Black family at the center of a horror film." 

The Us trailer opens warmly enough. A Black family — a mother, father, son and daughter travel along a country road with Luniz's 1995 hip-hop classic “I Got 5 On It” blasting from the radio. The father, Gabe (Winston Duke) sits in the driver's seat rapping along to the music as the mother, Adelaide (Lupita Nyong'o), turns toward the backseat eagerly trying to get her young children (Shahadi Wright Joseph and Evan Alex) to engage with the classic song. The kids, of course, are less than impressed. 

The Wilson family soon arrives at Adelaide’s old childhood beachside home in Northern California where they are spending the summer. They take in the day lounging at the beach with some old friends —the Tyler family (Elisabeth Moss and Tim Heidecker). Their blissful day quickly turns sinister when Adelaide —who is haunted by a past trauma -- notices that her son Jason (Alex) is no longer on the beach. Adelaide spirals into a panic running along the sand shouting for her son before finally finding Jason who —seems OK, though perhaps a little thrown off by an eerie figure he sees on the beach. Done with the beach for the day, the Wilsons head back to their summer home for the evening. As night swoops in, the family's lives descends into complete chaos. First, a figure clutching a large pair of shears appears in their driveway along with four silent figures clutching hands. From Peele and the cast's exclusive interview with Entertainment Weekly we've learned that these monsters are called "the Tethered." 

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Academy Award Nominated Film Editor Joi McMillon Talks the Art Of Assembling 'Moonlight' and 'If Beale Street Could Talk'

There is a poetry in cinema. A moviegoer might not realize it in the moment, but there is something magnetic about the way the dialogue and images bend and twist into one another, creating a narrative and allowing us to fall in love with a character, story, or even a moment. While the directors and actors are often recognized for their work —it’s the editors who work tirelessly during post-production to make sure that the filmmaker’s vision comes to life. Editor Joi McMillon, one of the only Black female feature film editors in Hollywood, is responsible for assembling Barry Jenkins’ Oscar-winning Moonlight and his latest work --If Beale Street Could Talk. 

McMillon’s journey in Hollywood has been fraught with curving roads and alternative paths that began in the editing room for various reality television series. After years of hard work, in 2017, she was nominated for an Academy Award for Film Editing with her co-editor Nat Sanders. She was the first Black woman to ever nominated in the category. Now, on the eve of If Beale Street Could Talk’s premiere, McMillon talked with Shadow and Act about her career, how she approaches her craft, and why this is just the beginning for her. 

“When Barry and Nat [Sanders], my co-editor, let me know that I was gonna be an editor on Moonlight, at first I couldn't believe it," McMillon remembered. "It’s one of those things where I'd been rejected so often on jobs that I felt were a good fit and the director and I had a good rapport, and the material spoke to me, only to be told, 'no,' a few weeks later. They'd say they'd gone with someone else, and it was interesting because a lot of times when people were telling me that they were going with someone else, they would say, 'He is just a really good fit,' or, 'We'd work with him before.' I was hearing 'he' and 'him' and I was like, 'Oh, this is who I'm losing these opportunities to.'" 

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