She had first posted about her harrowing experience the night she got home. When King’s story originally gained traction in 2015, effectively birthing the Twitter thread, it wasn’t the first time King had shared it. “I kind of feel like everyone’s catching up to where I’ve already been in my head.” “This experience for me is something that I manifested like my whole life,” King herself told Variety at Sundance 2020. Still, it’s too easy and also false to call this a moment of arrival for Bravo or any of the team members behind Zola. We’re not necessarily laughing at the same things we used to.Īnd so the making of Zola is a long, intense, exciting story in itself: how it almost landed in the wrong hands and how its visionary director, Bravo, culled the people and resources needed to elevate an already outrageous, disturbing story into an otherworldly circus, all the while paying homage to its origins. Moreover, the world’s become (hopefully) slightly more socially conscious, a bit more politically aware. Viral Twitter stories are now a dime a dozen, dealt with on a daily basis and usually devolving into an often tiring, pointless, circular discourse. Even when Zola finally premiered at Sundance in January 2020, there were only a few dozen reported cases of COVID-19 in the US. The world looks different from when Zola’s story went viral in 2015 - Obama was president, Trump had announced his presidential campaign, and Vine was still a thing. Zola experienced delays upon delays in each phase of its conception its players have been getting ready to be ready for years now. Zola marks the first time intellectual property has been sourced from Twitter.
#ROXANE GAY TWITTER ONE PERFECT SHOT AGE OF INNOCENCE MOVIE#
Despite - or perhaps because of - the public’s familiarity with its tale, Zola is arguably the must-see movie of the summer.īut the road to getting a film made is far from seamless, even more so when there’s no precedent for it. Harris and an electric cast featuring Paige, Keough, Nicholas Braun, and Colman Domingo, the stylish dark comedy pulls you into a hellish, kaleidoscopic “hoe trip” that feels both hyperreal and surreal. With a screenplay written by Bravo and playwright Jeremy O. Now Zola the film, directed by Janicza Bravo, finally arrives in theaters nearly six years later. Readers called for it to be optioned for the silver screen while others began dream casting.
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Obsessives include the likes of Solange Knowles (who later cast King in her own film), Ava DuVernay (who praised untapped talent from “the hood,” to which King clarified that she’s from the suburbs), and Missy Elliott, who tweeted how she had read the wild thread as if she were watching a movie. The stranger-than-fiction tale has become a piece of contemporary cultural history for the Extremely Online. Jessica brings along her squirrely boyfriend, Jarrett, as well as her enigmatic roommate, “Z.” The latter turns out to be her pimp, and Zola must contend with a chaotic, horrific weekend of deception, violence, and sex trafficking. For the uninitiated, here’s the gist: Zola is a 19-year-old server by day and stripper by night who allows herself to be seduced by Jessica - a flirtatious white stripper - into a work trip, driving from Detroit to Florida to dance. The original Twitter thread has been deleted (but remains immortalized on Imgur, with nearly 7 million views). “I think I had the same experience as everybody else, where it was just riveting.” Keough, however, had firsthand experience with the internet phenomenon known as both #TheStory and (perhaps more fittingly) “The Thotyssey.” “I had read the Twitter thread in 2015, and in real time,” revealed Keough, who said she couldn’t tear herself away from her screen as it was happening.
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“I only would tweet positive shit and log out,” said Paige.
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Paige’s two rescue dogs - Aretha and Juice - could be seen lounging behind her. Both she and her Zola costar Riley Keough were doing Zoom interviews from adjacent rooms at the London West Hollywood hotel. Even though she plays the titular role in Zola - the new dark comedy out this week that’s based on an infamous 2015 Twitter thread by A’Ziah “Zola” King - actor Taylour Paige admitted earlier this month that she had missed out on the tweetstorm when it happened.