Director Ava DuVernay on “Selma” and “A Wrinkle in Time”

The New Yorker Radio Hour

WNYC Studios and The New Yorker

Politics, Arts, News, Wnyc, Books, David, Storytelling, Society & Culture, Yorker, New, Remnick

4.2 • 6.2K Ratings

🗓️ 20 February 2018

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

No film adaptation of “A Wrinkle In Time,” Madeleine L’Engle’s beloved, and often banned, children’s book, published in 1962, has ever made it to American movie theaters. It finally comes to the screen next month, with a cast that includes Oprah Winfrey and Reese Witherspoon,. The director is Ava DuVernay, who wasn’t the obvious choice for a metaphysical fantasy epic. Best known for “Selma,” about the 1965 civil-rights march, DuVernay also made the documentary “13,” about the prison system, and the TV series “Queen Sugar.” But DuVernay tells the staff writer Jelani Cobb that she relished the opportunity to create a fantasy film. “You’re seeing worlds built through the point of view of a black woman from Compton,” she says. “So when I’m told, ‘Create a planet,’ my planet’s going to look different from my white male counterpart’s planet”—which is what Hollywood shows us “ninety-seven per cent of the time.” DuVernay and Cobb spoke at The New Yorker Festival in October, 2017.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is a real trade to the One World Observatory.
0:06.0	The Strait of the Block for West Boulevard and make that right.
0:10.0	They're trying to answer questions about upward mobility in America.
0:14.0	The military strategist, it was profiled brilliantly,
0:17.0	so I think if you could be defined this not culture of people. It's a kind of form of life on this planet that we haven't really seen before.
0:26.5	From One World Trade Center in Manhattan, this is the New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC
0:32.7	Studios and The New Yorker.
0:35.2	Welcome to The New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick.
0:38.8	Madeline Langel's A Rinkle in Time is one of the most beloved fantasy novels around,
0:43.1	and it's maybe surprising that we've never before seen the story in movie theaters.
0:48.8	But a big Hollywood version of A Rinkle in Time finally comes out next month
0:52.5	with a cast that includes Oprah Winfrey
0:54.7	and Reese Spoon. And there's one other surprising thing about the film. It's director, Ava Deverna.
1:01.2	DeVernay was hardly the obvious choice for a fantasy epic. She's best known for Selma about the
1:06.2	1965 Civil Rights March. And she put out the documentary 13th about the prison system and its impact on Black America,
1:13.6	and she's been making a TV series, Queen Sugar, about siblings who inherited sugarcane farm in Louisiana.
1:21.8	Ava D'Vernay appeared at the New Yorker Festival in October with staff writer Jelani Cobb.
1:28.2	Thank you.
1:29.3	Hi.
1:30.8	Hey.
1:32.3	Hey.
1:34.4	Hey.
	...

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