queen & slim
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Ava DuVernay and Netflix Formally Respond to When They See Us Lawsuit, Claim Dialogue Is Protected Under First Amendment
Netflix and When They See Us writer-director Ava DuVernay are fighting back on a lawsuit filed against them and the figurative punches are formal. As The Root reported in October, police interrogation firm John E. Reid and Associates filed a lawsuit against DuVernay and the production company/streaming platform in regard to the hit miniseries, claiming…
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The Cast and Crew of Queen & Slim on Black Love Being 'An Act of Resistance, Protest and Resilience'
Beyond the political allegory of two black people going on the run after killing a cop, Queen & Slim is a love story. Queen (Jodie Turner-Smith) and Slim (Daniel Kaluuya) have bounties on their heads for the crime they’ve committed and throughout all of their trials and tribulations, they find a special sense of connection…
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'Oppressors, Not Protectors': The Cast of Queen & Slim Reflect on Policing
As Solange once crooned, “this shit is for us.” At the time of this article’s posting, I’ve seen Queen & Slim three times and I have no doubt this film was primarily created for us. Still, like any movie, you want as many eyes on it as possible, so I had to give writer Lena…
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Keeping It 100: Essence Announces Its 3rd Annual 'Woke 100'
Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the wokest of them all? We kid, we kid—no one wants to play the Woke Olympics. But just like us, Essence has some ideas about who the most influential, inspiring folks of 2019 are—femme folks, in this instance—with its third annual Woke 100 List. Framed as a “salute to…
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'We Stand Here to Honor Her Life': Melina Matsoukas and Lena Waithe Memorialized #AtatianaJefferson at Elle's Women in Hollywood Awards
Queen & Slim director Melina Matsoukas was somber as she accepted her award at Elle’s 2019 Women in Hollywood awards ceremony on Monday night. As she explained to the assembled guests, her mind was on Atatiana Jefferson, the 28-year-old killed in her own home on Saturday by police officer Aaron Dean in Fort Worth, Texas.…
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Anxiety, Intimacy and Creating While Black: Zendaya and the Women of Queen & Slim Talk Being 'Women in Hollywood'
Ladies first: That’s the message of Elle’s 2019 Women in Hollywood issue, which features Zendaya and Queen & Slim’s Lena Waithe, Melina Matsoukas and Jodie Turner-Smith on three of its nine covers. And as Elle notes, it’s also a celebration of firsts: Lena Waithe’s first time writing a feature film, Melina Matsoukas’ first time directing…
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‘Let’s Go’: I Watched the First 12 Minutes of Queen & Slim at Essence Fest. Damn.
“Black people don’t live, they survive,” Lena Waithe uttered to an eager audience of Essence Fest patrons who had just witnessed something that left us wanting more. That line not only reflects reality but embodies the upcoming film she wrote, Queen & Slim, directed by Melina Matsoukas. In case you need a refresher, here’s this…
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2019 BET Awards: The Horses Were in the Back and Black Women Were in the Front
The 19th annual BET Awards have come and gone and it was the blackest way to start the summer. I watched the shenanigans go down live from one of the blackest media rooms in the game. After top-nominated Cardi B opened the show with her single “Press,” Queen Host Regina Hall brought D.C. to L.A.…
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‘Everybody’s Fine’: Lena Waithe Elaborates on That Viral ‘Denzel and Will’ Comment
See, what had happened was … Lena Waithe came under fire after her June 21, 2019, New York Times interview, where she expressed her frustrations about the lack of black financiers supporting black-led narratives in film. While on the surface, it seemed as if she was simply expressing her hope for more profit for black…