Last Updated Sunday, September 10, 2023 8:51PM EDT
In the film, Monk , is a frustrated author who's agent tells him his books — the latest of which is a reworking of Aeschylus’ “The Persians” — aren't “Black enough.” “I'm Black," he responds, “and this is my book.” “I worked as a journalist for eight or nine years before working in television," he added. "I was having the exact same conversations with Black colleagues in both professions: Why are we always writing about misery and trauma and violence and pain inflicted on Blacks? Why is this what people expect from us? Why is this the only thing we have to offer to culture?”
At the TIFF premiere, Jefferson took a moment to note that he loves movies like “12 Years a Slave” and “New Jack City.” But Jefferson, lamenting “a poverty of imagination when it comes to what Black life looks like,” said other films on the spectrum should exist, too.While Woody Allen's film may be a reference point to “American Fiction,” direct comparisons are harder to come by for such a breezy but biting commentary. Tracee Ellis Ross, Sterling K.