EXCLUSIVE
BROTHER Clement Virgo gets personal with a searing drama of racial injustice in Toronto…
When writer-director Clement Virgo first picked up David Chariandy’s novel Brother in 2018, he couldn’t put it down. There was something within the tale of two immigrant siblings that resonated deeply with him. ‘The story of the family, the story of the immigrant experience, the story of trying to find your personhood spoke to me,’ he tells Teasers.
Virgo’s haunting new adaptation has Aaron Pierre (The Underground Railroad) and Lamar Johnson (The Last of Us) as chalk-and-cheese brothers Francis and Michael, raised by single mother Ruth (Marsha Stephanie Blake). One is an extroverted musical talent, the other is quiet and watchful, until their lives are knocked off course by racial injustice.
It’s a stirring exploration of family, loss and Black masculinity, which draws from Virgo’s own experience of growing up in Toronto, where the film is set. ‘I was very sensitive,’ says the director, whose credits include The Wire, Empire and Billions. ‘I had to present myself [as] tougher than I was.’ What he calls the ‘performance of masculinity’ is explored here with grace and depth.
Music plays a big part, too, as Brother draws together songs from Nina Simone, Curtis Mayfield and Eric B. & Rakim. ‘I was interested in exploring music from the Black diaspora, because that’s the music I grew up with.’ And when a track dies out, there’s a hushed poetry that courses through this drama about the heavy pall that grief can cast.
‘Hopefully the audience [will] recognise some emotional truth in the film,’ says Virgo. ‘I want people to be moved, entertained, and to be inspired.’ ANN LEE
BROTHER OPE
