Christine Swanson
How would you like to take a road trip with your ex-fiancé’s mother, who was the reason you broke off the engagement?
Celeste Simmons (Renee Elise Goldsberry) is a New York executive who has to travel to D.C. for an important meeting. Her flight was cancelled, so she rented the last car available to make the drive. At the counter, she runs into her ex-fiancé’s mother, Paula Henderson (Lynn Whitfield), who is trying to return to her home on Albany Road in D.C. Now is the time to say that Paula is the major reason the couple broke up.
After much conversation, Celeste agrees to give Paula a ride. Things that happen along the way are both hilarious and predictable. After a few detours, the duo ends up at Paula’s sister’s home, who should be visiting Celeste’s ex-fiancé Kyle (J. Alphonse Nicholson) and his new fiancé.
This movie is a wonderful film to watch because it contains funny moments, revelations, a few tears, and happy endings.
As a member of the African American Film Critics Association (AAFCA), I had the honor of participating in a roundtable discussion with Christine Swanson, Lynn Whitfield, and J. Alphonse Nicholson, the directors and writers of the films.
Christine explained that she sees Albany Road as a romantic dramedy and that real life issues are catalyst points to really show humanity in people who happen to be Black. She went on to say, “The story resonates with any ethnicity because we’re dealing with emotional and human connection. So, I loved exploring emotional and human connection through these Black characters that speak to what everybody deals with: conflict between someone you love and your mother or a spouse or almost spouse or not almost spouse. And we just mash them up together in one location and have them all hash it out, which is a recipe for an exciting story.”
When asked what was most challenging about doing the show, Lynn Whitfield stated a personal experience I won’t tell you about as it would be a spoiler moment. Still, the other challenging part for her was doing a film without a lot of concealer and contour. Lynn said, “I was really freaked out to not have all of my accouterments.”
Christine explained, “Lynn was to allow me to use her instrument without layers of makeup because this character evolves into the basic elements of life, whether in dealing with the elements physically, externally, or internally. So, there are many scenes where Lynn is not wearing makeup or not a lot of makeup. To me, that was part of the storytelling and the revealing of Paula on multiple levels.
We see Black women most times overly made up, extensive wigging. In this movie, everyone wears natural hair except one character. We’ve seen the movie, and we understand why. And what I really wanted to do was put a lens on the faces and into the hearts of Black women in the way that we know each other. So, it is an exploration of our humanity in the most basic layers. And Lynn allowed me to do that. And I think it serves the character in a way that we have not on screen regarding Black storytelling.”
J. Alphonse Nicholson, who plays Kyle, was asked about how his character resonated with communication between Black men and Black women and telling them what they want and need. Even Black men who are highly educated and well-spoken have a hard time expressing themselves.
His response was, “I think Kyle has to work on that. Just because he’s a tenured professor doesn’t mean he’s great at communicating with his mom and his fiancé and ex-fiancé. I think he made some bad decisions when it came down to how soon he should have communicated something or how he should have communicated. And then just proper anger management. Sometimes, it doesn’t always look like yelling and putting your fist through something, but yeah, not being able to express your feelings to your mother or not being able to have a conversation, this movie, to be quite honest with you, prompts me to have deeper conversations with my mom.” He went on to say, “My wife encouraged me when we saw the film to say, “Hey, I think you need to have a deeper conversation about some of the conflicts that you’ve had with your mom.” And so, I think, playing this character, I hope it does spark that for a lot of Black men, as well as the women in our community and everyone in between, that communication is key. And without it, you can find yourself in trouble. You can find yourself in a dark place. And so, I have experienced that in my personal life and have been able to experience it as a storyteller and then find myself in the middle of a real-life experience, man. And it truly has been helpful for me. And, hopefully, it helps someone else, too.”
As you can probably tell, the roundtable discussion was very informative. The film “ALBANY ROAD,” which was shot in and around my hometown of Champaign, Illinois, is an excellent film. “I suggest it as a must-see when it comes to a theater near you.
If you would like to see the entire AAFCA roundtable discussion, visit https://youtu.be/9DKlNmSx-MY
I give the film ALBANY ROAD 5 out of 5 winks of the EYE!
Until next time, keep your EYE to the sky!