Director David Black has signed with Reverie Content, the production company founded in 2019 by partners/executive producers Rich Pring and Cathleen O’Conor Stern. This marks Black’s first commercial representation as a director.
Already at his new roost, Black has directed a short film, Rodarte SS22, which delves into fashion brand Rodarte’s spring/summer 2022 collection. With the historic Westbeth Artist Housing as a backdrop, Black’s film–which partnered the director with designers Kate and Laura Mulleavy–takes us behind the scenes during New York Fashion Week with a rare and intimate look that captures Kate and Laura’s creative process in the weeks leading up to the show. Kate and Laura share the origins of their concept, uniquely fusing their signature approach to fashion through storytelling. This time, they take us on a journey inspired by their father’s rediscovered work as a mycologist and their mother’s ethereal fungi art. The latter would be beautifully integrated into the show’s spectacular finale, celebrating mother nature, and connecting us through a billowing mushroom dress.
Black’s enigmatic lens echoes the spirit of the collection’s mystical inspiration while paying homage to the familial roots. Black was privy to their parents’ personal collection of slides and drawings that lent to the weight and depth of the film, giving the sense that their poetic artistry was cultivated and nurtured by their upbringing. Black said of the designers: “They’re sisters that feed off each other’s energy…like they’re separate parts of the same brain. There’s a creative bond there. They approach the creative process from different angles but unified at the end.”
The five-minute film is set to premiere in partnership with Amazon Luxury which exclusively features high-end, ready-to-wear brands.
Multi-disciplinary artist
Black is a photographer, director, and visual artist whose body of work includes collaborations with Apple, Google, Netflix, A&E, Coca-Cola, Alaska Airlines, Shinola, Oppo, Coors, Ray-Ban, Levi’s, Nike, Adidas, Stella McCartney, Spotify, Converse, Reebok and Peloton.
He has become sought after by contemporary performing artists having worked with top talent including Daft Punk, Giorgio Moroder, Kim Gordon, Cat Power, Kendrick Lamar, and the Kills. In 2020, Black directed a music video in collaboration with Black Lips x Gucci. The year prior, Hat & Beard published Black’s second book, “The Days Change at Night.” Black has earned honors from Photo District News, Print Magazine, and the Art Directors Club.
Review: Malcolm Washington Makes His Feature Directing Debut With “The Piano Lesson”
An heirloom piano takes on immense significance for one family in 1936 Pittsburgh in August Wilson's "The Piano Lesson." Generational ties also permeate the film adaptation, in which Malcolm Washington follows in his father Denzel Washington's footsteps in helping to bring the entirety of The Pittsburgh Cycle — a series of 10 plays — to the screen.
Malcolm Washington did not start from scratch in his accomplished feature filmmaking debut. He enlisted much of the cast from the recent Broadway revival with Samuel L. Jackson (Doaker Charles), his brother, John David Washington (Boy Willie), Ray Fisher (Lymon) and Michael Potts (Whining Boy). Berniece, played by Danielle Brooks in the play, is now beautifully portrayed by Danielle Deadwyler. With such rich material and a cast for whom it's second nature, it would be hard, one imagines, to go wrong. Jackson's own history with the play goes back to its original run in 1987 when he was Boy Willie.
It's not the simplest thing to make a play feel cinematic, but Malcolm Washington was up to the task. His film opens up the world of the Charles family beyond the living room. In fact, this adaptation, which Washington co-wrote with "Mudbound" screenwriter Virgil Williams, goes beyond Wilson's text and shows us the past and the origins of the intricately engraved piano that's central to all the fuss. It even opens on a big, action-filled set piece in 1911, during which the piano is stolen from a white family's home. Another fleshes out Doaker's monologue in which he explains to the uninitiated, Fisher's Lymon, and the audience, the tortured history of the thing. While it might have been nice to keep the camera on Jackson, such a great, grounding presence throughout, the good news is that he really makes... Read More