Ahead of the film’s world premiere in September at the Toronto International Film Festival, Netflix has released the first trailer for Tyler Perry’s “A Jazzman’s Blues,” the billionaire media mogul’s longtime passion project.
Written, directed and produced by Perry, the period drama tells the tale of forbidden love, starring Joshua Boone and Solea Pfeiffer as Bayou and Leanne, a star-crossed couple navigating the world as young Black people in the deep South during the 1940s and the decades that follow.
“That was our first kiss. Ain’t nothing felt that good in all my life,” Boone’s Bayou narrates as the trailer opens on the lovers sharing a sweet smooch while sitting in a sun-soaked tree.
The dramatic scenes that follow show the trials that test the couple’s love as their families and other outside forces try to force them apart. In spite of the odds stacked against them — and as the trailer teases — “true love will guide you home.”
Rounding out the film’s ensemble cast are Amirah Vann, Austin Scott, Milauna Jemai Jackson, Brent Antonello, Brad Benedict, Kario Marcel, Lana Young and Ryan Eggold.
“I feel like it’s all that I wanted it to be and more, so I’m ready for the world to see it,” Perry told PvNew about the film during an exclusive sitdown at the Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival (MVAAFF) earlier this month. “I’m excited about the world seeing a different side of me.”
Despite waiting so long for this moment to arrive, Perry didn’t feel at all nervous about sharing a project so close to his heart with the world. “once I do it and surrender it, that’s it; there’s nothing I can do differently,” he explained. “There’s nothing I can change at this point. It is what it is. And I have to let it go.”
As excited as Perry is to demonstrate his range as an artist and filmmaker to audiences and with “A Jazzman’s Blues,” the experience of making the film also changed his relationship to the medium.
Asked what he learned about himself as a filmmaker while on set of the long-awaited project, he replied: “It taught me that I love it.”
“I’d always seen making movie as work,” Perry explained. ”But the feeling that I got every day on set was that I love this. Directing, for me, was all about the necessity of just because I wanted to tell the stories. But this one made me sit in it. And I was in so much joy every day.”
At the festival, Perry debuted select footage from the film before a packed auditorium of more than 800 film lovers who were anxious to get a sneak peek at the film, explaining the process that went into bringing the project to life. (Watch the full conversation here.)
“A Jazzman’s Blues” has been at the back of Perry’s mind for more than 27 years. He wrote the script — his first ever — in 1995, after a chance encounter with August Wilson at an afterparty for one of the legendary playwright’s shows in Atlanta.
“I didn’t have money to get into the theater, so I had to wait until after,” Perry recalled. “He was so kind and so gracious. I was telling about the type of plays that I do — and he could sense how ashamed I was [about not having money]. But he was very much like, ‘No, no, this is good. You need to go home and write what you feel,’ and that’s where ‘Jazzman’ came from.”
After years of sitting on the shelf, the project ultimately landed with Netflix, following Perry’s successful collaboration with the streamer on 2020’s “A Fall From Grace.”
“I did it independently and sent it to them, and they were surprised at the reaction, and how many people tuned in, and then it was like, ‘What else have you got?'” he explained. “I said, I’ve got Madea [referencing 2022’s ‘A Madea Homecoming’] and ‘A Jazzman’s Blues.’ They said, ‘Give us both.'”
With the moment finally upon him, Perry got the script back out, making only minor changes. For example, the story was originally set in Perry’s hometown of New Orleans, La., but he ultimately changed the setting to Georgia, where he’s lived since the 1990s and has built his massive Tyler Perry Studios. (“A Jazzman’s Blues” shot on location in Savannah, with interior scenes filmed at his Atlanta studios.) Perry had also imagined himself playing the role of Bayou, with Halle Berry in the part of Leanne and Will Smith as Bayou’s brother, Willie Earl, with whom he has a contentious relationship, back in 1995. But since, as Perry describes it, they’ve all “aged out” of these roles, he set out on a mission to find a new crop of standout actors, ultimately casting Boone, Pfeiffer and Scott.
“I started doing auditions and then I started asking people about the crop of actors who were like the ones in ‘A Soldier’s Story,’ where they had Denzel Washington, Howard Rollins, Laurence Fishburne. Where’s that crop of actors coming up? Then Austin Scott and Joshua Boone’s names came up and they led me to Solea,” Perry said, noting his excitement for the people to witness the talent he saw in their auditions. “I think they’re superstars, I really do.”
Audiences got their first glimpse of what the talented trio could do in the first-look footage, which is set to the romantic ballad “Paper Airplanes,” performed by Ruth B., who is among the heavy-hitters Perry enlisted to add panache to the musical components of the jazz age-set story. The film also features songs arranged and produced by Grammy-winner and Academy Award-nominee Terence Blanchard, music by Aaron Zigman and choreography by the legendary Debbie Allen.
Allen had been in the know about the project since the early 2000s, when she and Perry had attempted to mount a production while she worked at DreamWorks. That iteration fell apart, but Perry was quick to call back once Netflix got on board.
“The timing was supposed to be what it was,” Perry said. “And then Terence, that’s New Orleans. That’s home. That’s jazz. That’s the feel, so it was a no brainer for me.”
Ruth B. and Blanchard collaborated on the original song, released by Sony Music, which is available everywhere now, layering the Ethiopian-Canadian singer’s vocals above a rousing chorus of strings and piano composed by the pair.
“After having initial discussions and going over the script with Tyler Perry’s team, I knew what Bayou’s and Leanne’s song needed to be — a song of longing and deep, timeless love, a once-in-a-lifetime love,” Ruth B. said in a statement about the track. “I am endlessly thankful to Tyler Perry for trusting me with this song and giving me the opportunity to write my first original song for a major motion picture.‘A Jazzman’s Blues’ is an absolutely beautiful and classic story filled with depth and truth, and I’m so excited for the world to see.”
Now that Perry is wrapped on this dream project, the one that’s been with him so long, he’s set his sights on other dreams, with a number of ideas in various stages, ranging from a zombie movie to a story about Hurricane Katrina. Up next is a thriller, followed by a project set during World War II about “some incredible people that were overlooked for years.”
“They’re all in the can,” Perry teased. ”I’m just waiting for the right time to start pulling them out.”
“A Jazzman’s Blues,” a Tyler Perry film, makes its world premiere on Sun. Sept. 11 at TIFF and launches Sept. 23 on Netflix. Watch the full trailer below.
