The project marks another high-profile title for Annapurna, which recently entered the distribution game after spending years as a financier. Kathryn Bigelows Detroit, which bows on Aug. 4, is the first movie under the studios new slate.
Based on the novel by James Baldwin, If Beale Street Could Talk, the story follows Tish, a newly engaged Harlem woman who races against the clock to prove her lovers innocence while carrying their first born child. It is a celebration of love told through the story of a young couple, their families and their lives, trying to bring about justice through love, for love and the promise of the American dream.
Production on the film is expected to start in October.
Jenkins, who has wanted to make the film for many years, wrote the screenplay during the same summer sojourn in 2013 when he penned Moonlight. Since then, Jenkins has been working with the Baldwin Estate. Baldwins sister, Gloria Karefa-Smart, says, We are delighted to entrust Barry Jenkins with this adaptation. Barry is a sublimely conscious and gifted filmmaker, whose medicine for melancholy impressed us so greatly that we had to work with him.
