Descendant To Get Gala Premiere At Mobile Saenger

Emmett Lewis appears in Descendant by Margaret Brown, an official selection of the U.S. Documentary Competition at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute.

MOBILE, Ala. — The award-winning documentary Descendant, which tells the story of the Africatown community founded by survivors of the slave ship Clotilda, will get a gala premiere on October 22 at Saenger Theatre Mobile, AL.com reported. The screening will begin at 7:30 p.m., followed by a question-and-answer session with filmmakers starting at 9:30 p.m. Attendance is free, but online registration is required. The documentary was directed by Mobile native Margaret Brown and co-written by Brown and University of South Alabama folklorist Kern Jackson. Descendant premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in early 2022 and won a Special Jury Award for Creative Vision. It won a distribution deal with Netflix and Higher Ground, the production company founded by Barack and Michelle Obama. Netflix will begin streaming the film on October 21, and its limited theatrical release will include screenings at Mobile’s Crescent Theater starting on October 23.