*Gabourey Sidibe says she found her voice as a director when Refinery29 approached her about making a short film, as part of an initiative to encourage young women filmmakers.
The Oscar-nominated star of Precious has made her directorial debut with “The Tale Of Four,” a multi-layered story inspired by Nina Simone’s “Four Women” that spans one day in the lives of four different women connected by their quest for love, agency, and redemption.
Sidibe “weaves together narratives from female activists, sexual assault survivors, and the children of imprisoned moms,” notes Refinery29, adding that “the short film resonates as a portrait of contemporary American society still infected by the racism elegized by Simone over 50 years ago.”
Watch the tale via the clip above.
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“As I do with most things I’m afraid of, I talk about them, make them audible, hoping that addressing the fear will alleviate it,” Sidibe told Refinery29 earlier this year. “That’s what the film is about: addressing it, saying it out loud, and hoping that through sharing my fear and my outrage that it will cause more outrage and more fear.”
The Tale Of Four will premiere at Refinery29, on October 24.
During an interview with Variety, the actress noted her frustration with the lack diverse voices behind the camera.
“It’s kind of like we only make these kinds of things because that’s what the audience is. It cuts off the rest of the world. We’re not telling the story because nobody needs it. No, no, I’m here. I’m the audience,” she said. “Unfortunately, in today’s society, you don’t know you exist unless you see yourself in media. That’s not necessarily a bad thing because it will push the artist who is a different color or gender, if you don’t see yourself, you have to figure out a way to make yourself be seen. We can do that in a lot of spaces from YouTube to Instagram. That proves the audience is there. The studios don’t believe the audience is there. So we have to keep making independent films in a bigger, more obvious way so they see we do exist, we do count and we will spend money.”
Read more from Gabby’s Variety interview here.
