Looking for Langston

A black and white, fantasy-like recreation of high-society gay men during the Harlem Renaissance, with archival footage and photographs intercut with a story. A wake is going on, with mourners gathered around a coffin. Downstairs is an elegant bar where tuxedoed men dance and talk. One of them has a dream in which he comes upon Beauty, who seems to reject him, although when he awakes, Beauty is sleeping beside him. His story and his visits to the jazz and dance club are framed by voices reading from the poetry and essays of Hughes and others. The text is rarely explicit, but the freedom of gay Black men in the 1920s in Harlem is suggested and celebrated visually.

Cast

Ben Ellison Alex

Matthew Baidoo Beauty

Akim Mogaji James

John Wilson Karl

Dencil Williams Marcus

Guy Burgess Dean Dublin James Wahlberg Carlos

Harry Donaldson Leatherboy

Jimmy Somerville Angel

Langston Hughes Self (archive footage)

Stuart Hall British (voice)

Metadata from the source database.