which chronicled her birthday pilgrimage to Africa. She celebrated the BET+ series first, hosting a private bowling and ice-skating bash at the Miami Beach Edition on June 15, the same night the doc began streaming.
“My Journey to 50” is about finding one’s self, an expedition she embarked on in an effort to more truly and freely live the next 50 to 60 years of her life. “If you find self, you find freedom,” she explained. “And what better way to find self and the source of all of our selves than Africa — the birthplace of all civilization, the birthplace of everything that’s good has happened in the world.”
The celebration continued the next day, June 16, at the Black Excellence Brunch, which promoted Netflix’s “Strong Black Summer” with “The Perfect Find” andLater that night, Union-Wade hit the red carpet for the movie’s boisterous centerpiece screening for ABFF passholders. The film is based on the book by Tia Williams — where Union-Wade first fell in love with the character — and features the type of May-December romance you usually see led by older white men, not a Black woman over 40. As such, it presents a new possibility for Union-Wade and the filmmakers to expand Hollywood’s attitudes about what sells, and the crowds at ABFF and Tribeca affirmed their instincts. “The people are speaking, and it’s time we listen,” she said.