Woke Bae! Jesse Williams To Make Directorial Debut With Biopic Centered On Emmett Till’s Mother

Our favorite woke bae, Jesse Williams, is set to make his feature length directorial debut with Till, a film about Mamie Elizabeth Till-Mobley, the mother of Emmett Till.

The film, written by Michael Reilly and civil rights filmmaker Keith A. Beauchamp, will focus on Till-Mobley’s search for justice after her son was lynched in 1955 after being accused of flirting with a white woman.

Taking place in Jim Crow-era Mississippi, Till’s murder was a turning point of the civil rights movement, after Till-Mobley famously insisted on an open-casket ceremony so her son’s mutilated body could be on public display for the world to see what white terrorists did to her son.

“I’m honored to be directing the story of Mamie & Emmett: a tale of revolutionary defiance in the face of tremendous personal and public devastation,” Williams told Deadline Monday. “An exploration of power and pulling back the curtain on cultural violence; of boyhood and maternity challenging America’s reflex to hide from itself; underdogs refusing to pretend that terror is freedom.”

The movie is based on Beauchamp’s 2005 documentary, The Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till, which led the United States Department of Justice to reopen the Till case in 2004. The reopening was first revealed to Congress in a March 2018 report.

Williams will produce the film with Whoopi Goldberg, who is also set appear in the project.

Production is expected to start next summer with the support of the Till family.