*Queen Latifah and Jill Scott have joined Lifetime’s original movie about the water-contamination crisis in Flint, MI, from Sony Pictures TV.
Betsy Brandt and Marin Ireland are also set to headline the project. Cher was previously attached to star in and executive produce but pulled out last month citing a serious family issue.
The movie received some backlash for casting Cher, a white woman, at the center of a narrative about a majority black city. However others brushed off the complaints by noting that white and Latina women have been affected by the water crisis as well.
Hollywood doesn’t want to put black people at the center of narrative about, what some call, a terrorist act against PRIMARILY black people. For Hollywood to take on this topic, there HAS to be a WHITE HERO — otherwise, why bother.
Queen Latifah will serve as an executive producer on “Flint” alongside Craig Zadan, Neil Meron and Katie Couric. Directed by Bruce Beresford from a script by Barbara Stepansky, the story was inspired by the Time magazine cover story, “The Toxic Tap,” by Josh Sanburn.
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As Deadline notes, the story follows the true account of three women who sought justice after the government deliberately contaminated the water, and residents of the city unknowingly drank and used lead-laden water. The actions of these three women inspired a national movement for safe drinking water despite the political powers working against them.
Brandt, Scott and Ireland will play real-life activists and Latifah will play a fourth resident, fighting to expose the poisoning of the community during the events of the water crisis.
“[Making a movie] is usually something they do after the fact, as opposed to while a situation is ongoing,” Flint Michigan NAACP President Frances Gilcreast told ATTN: “Any time you can conceptualize a plot, create it and we’re still under the same issue, that’s more like 19th Century [response] on an issue rather than the 21st Century.”
Do you agree with Gilcreast’s statement?
“Flint” begins production this week.
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