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Hello, and welcome to the Scene 2 Seen Podcast. I am Valerie Complex, an associate editor and film writer at Deadline. Today, for the final episode of 2023 (!), we're talking to director-writer Cord Jefferson and producer Jermaine Johnson about their latest project American Fiction, which won the…

EXCLUSIVE: Laura Karpman was drip-fed jazz notes when she was a baby. Her mother's turn-table featured a playlist that included Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald, Wes Montgomery and Thelonious Monk, the virtuoso pianist, whose music informs and underpins her own jazz-infused score for Cord Jefferson's…

Searchlight Pictures’ Poor Things had a monster of an expansion, sewing up $1.3 million at just 82 theaters for a no. 10 spot at the weekend box office. American Fiction and The Zone of Interest, from, respectively, Amazon MGM Studios and A24, opened nicely as specialty films with original stories of all…

So far, Cord Jefferson is having a hell of a feature film directorial and screenwriting debut. His first movie, American Fiction, had its world premiere at the Toronto Film Festival in September and came away from it winning the much-desired and often…

Encountering Percival Everett's Erasure was serendipitous for Cord Jefferson, as he saw many similarities between himself and the character of Monk. He knew he needed to write and direct the film adaptation, and discovered the perfect casting when he began reading it in the voice of Jeffrey Wright. He ran…

"This was three years ago, that I had a note from an executive on a script that I wrote that I needed to make a character 'Blacker'," director Cord Jefferson said at Deadline's Contenders Film: Los Angeles panel for American Fiction. "A lot of this is taken directly from my personal experience having…

After establishing itself as a probable awards contender at TIFF, where it won the People’s Choice Award, the publishing world satire American Fiction, marking the first feature from writer-director Cord Jefferson, has unveiled its first trailer. An adaptation of Percival Everett’s novel Erasure that…

EXCLUSIVE: Cord Jefferson’s feature directorial debut American Fiction is changing up its release plan, shifting from a November 3 limited opening to December 15. The MGM/MRC theatrical release, which stars Jeffrey Wright, Issa Rae, Sterling K. Brown, Tracee Ellis Ross and Skyler Wright and just…

American Fiction Section: Special Presentation / People's Choice Award Winner Director: Cord Jefferson  Writers: Cord Jefferson Logline: American Fiction is Cord Jefferson’s hilarious directorial debut, which confronts our culture's obsession with reducing people to outrageous…

EXCLUSIVE: Filmmaker Cord Jefferson has, in recent years, made two life-changing decisions. In 2008, he donated a kidney to his father. "That was easy," he said. "That was one of the easiest decisions I ever made. I mean, he gave me life. I feel like the kidney's half his," the 41-year-old…

In Cord Jefferson cinematic adaptation of Percival Everett's Erasure, American Fiction emerges as a hard-hitting commentary on identity, storytelling and the microaggressive terrains of the publishing industry. With a powerhouse ensemble, led by Jeffrey…

EXCLUSIVE: Jeffrey Wright is set to star in the untitled film from MRC and T-Street based on the novel Erasure by Percival Everett. Cord Jefferson wrote the adaptation and is making his feature directorial debut. Wright plays Thelonious "Monk" Ellison, an English professor and author who writes a…