New York City has always been the perfect place for stories about love—messy, complicated, and endlessly intriguing. And in Love, Brooklyn, filmmaker Rachael Abigail Holder’s debut feature, André Holland steps into a role that embraces all three.
The romantic drama, hitting select theaters on August 29 before expanding nationwide on September 5, follows Holland as a Brooklyn-based writer caught between two very different loves: his gallery-owning ex (Nicole Beharie) and his current partner, a single mother navigating her own healing journey (DeWanda Wise).
With his loyal best friend (Roy Wood Jr.) by his side, Holland’s character wrestles with heartbreak, passion, and the question of whether you can truly love two people, or if one love will always pull you back in.
The film, written by Paul Zimmerman, first premiered at Sundance earlier this year, where it garnered praise for its rich, layered storytelling and nuanced portrayal of Black love. Holland, who also serves as a producer, shared the uphill battle to get the movie financed, crediting longtime collaborator Steven Soderbergh for stepping in as an executive producer to push the project forward.
“We had this script and were out to all the places that everyone goes to to get financing,” Holland told The Wrap. “People just, I think, didn’t share the vision. They didn’t quite see the value, but that’s often the case.” But when Soderbergh signed on to executive produce, the doors began to open.
Holder explained that while the original script wasn’t written with Black actors in mind, she saw an opportunity to infuse the story with cultural specificity that made it feel authentic. “Blackness is a wide scope of people,” she told IndieWire. “We didn’t just want the characters to be Black period… I wanted them to be specific.”
The trailer for Love, Brooklyn is pure romance-meets-reality: subway rides, late-night walks through brownstone-lined streets, heated arguments spilling out onto rain-soaked sidewalks, and quiet moments that remind you why love is worth the risk. It’s New York love at its most cinematic, but with the added tension of a man torn between the love that shaped him and the love that’s shaping who he’s becoming.
Love, Brooklyn isn’t just another love story; it’s a meditation on second chances, emotional honesty, and how difficult it can be to write your next chapter when your heart is still editing the last one.
If Sundance buzz is any indication, this one is going to hit audiences where it counts: right in the chest.
