KELVIN HARRISON JR. PLAYS A FORMER CHILD SOLDIER ADOPTED BY AMERICAN PARENTS IN LUCE. PHOTO © JON PACK 42 JULY <strong>2019</strong>
Beyond the Façade JULIUS ONAH’S LUCE EXPLORES THE INNER TURMOIL OF A MODEL IMMIGRANT STUDENT BY KEVIN LALLY >> Star athlete and brilliant debate-team captain at his Virginia high school, 17-yearold Luce is accomplished by any measure. His American success story is particularly amazing, however, because he’s a former child soldier from Eritrea, whose life took a positive path when he was adopted by white couple Amy and Peter Edgar. But there’s more to Luce than that wholesome picture. A troubling complication is revealed when his teacher reads an essay he’s written that seems to condone violence, and she subsequently finds fireworks stored in his locker. MAN BEHIND THE CAMERA Nigerian American filmmaker Julius Onah’s previous film was the J.J. Abrams–produced The Cloverfield Paradox. Adapted from J.C. Lee’s 2013 stage play by Lee and director Julius Onah, Luce is a gripping drama about race, perception, and identity that, like its lead character, keeps you continually off-balance and uncertain where your allegiances lie from scene to scene. For Onah, the project is particularly personal, since he was born in Nigeria, the son of a diplomat, and traveled the world before settling in Arlington, Virginia, at age 10, where he lived with his mother and siblings after his father returned to Africa. “I grappled with identity in many different ways, on a number of different levels,” Onah says of his youthful experience as a new arrival in America. “What did it mean to be an African? What did it mean to be an African American? What did it mean to be an immigrant? Because of the conditions I grew up in, there were certain moments of my time when I had privilege, and there were certain moments when I didn’t have privilege. Yet, in my interactions with people, one label or another would be the one that they chose to apply. So, as we continue to grapple with identity in this country in ways that are becoming much more complex, it requires a conversation that is much more nuanced. And that is not something that I think as a country at large we’re quite used to yet. We’ve had these traditional notions of what lane everybody’s supposed to be in.” Onah continues, “When I first read the play, I was struck by the sophistication it had and the intelligence with which it was grappling with identity and this notion that we all live on a spectrum and are more than one thing beyond what I just see. So is everybody in this room. And as we come to grips with that, there are truths we’re going to find, there are things we’re going to learn about each other that make living in the community and the idea of what America’s supposed to represent something much more achievable. But we’re at a moment where, regardless of what your politics are, I don’t think that the idea of the spectrum that we live on and the multiplicity of identities that one person can contain is one that anybody has quite come to terms with yet. There are entrenched and internalized and now outdated ideas that we still haven’t unearthed. It was exciting, just on a social and political level, to explore those ideas, but also to use those ideas as the engine of a thriller that can leave the audience on the edge of their seats. But not in the typical JULY <strong>2019</strong> 43
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CLASSIC COVER AUGUST 19, 1974