Are you ready for The American Society Of Magical Negroes?
Social media is buzzing over the eyebrow-raising trailer for The American Society Of Magical Negroes which satirizes the age-old Hollywood trope of the “Magical Negro” whose sole purpose is to help white characters on their own journeys in films.
Coined by Spike Lee in 2001, the term continues to slither its way into Black cinema with examples ranging from Michael Clarke Duncan‘s John Coffey in The Green Mile to Mahershala Ali‘s Don Shirley in Green Book.
Now, after years of diversity baby steps in Hollywood, writer-director Kobi Lobii is flipping the trope on its head with The American Society Of Magical Negroes set to premiere at 2024’s Sundance Film Festival.
In the film, a young man named Aren is recruited into a secret society of magical Black people who dedicate their lives to a cause of utmost importance: making white people’s lives easier, per the official synopsis.
Check out the trailer below:
Directed by Libii, the film stars Justice Smith, David Alan Grier, An-Li Bogan, Drew Tarver, Michaela Watkins, Aisha Hinds, and Tim Baltz with Rupert Friend and Nicole Byer.
“I think of the Magical Negro as a kind of stock Black character; a Black best friend character who is only focused on helping the white hero,” said Libii in an interview with BET.
“They don’t really have an inner life, and they don’t have their own things going on. They’re just relentlessly focused on helping this white character grow in most cases, and I always thought that was so funny. For whatever reason, the idea that there’s a white writer who pictures the thing we do in the morning is getting up and trying to help them.
I found it so absurd and incorrect and funny that I wanted to blow it out and criticize it, but also use it as a way to talk about other stuff. What it’s like to grow up as a Black person in this culture and some of the wild and fantastical things we have to do to survive. To me, that’s the origin story of the film.”
Will you be seated for The American Society Of Magical Negroes (opening in theaters March 22, 2024)? Or would you rather just see a Black Hogwarts movie instead? Tell us down below and peep some Twitter chitter-chatter over the trailer on the flip.
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