Directed by Rickey Larke
COMEDY
This film is available from November 27-30, 2020. To watch or vote for this film please click on the orange “TICKETS” button below and purchase a ticket for BLOCK 10.
Synopsis
During a second Tinder date a socially awkward swain and a beautiful old soul find common ground, after she uses him to build her new bed.
Originally from Chicago, Rickey Larke found his passion for creativity as a child while on summer trips visiting his mother’s family in Panama. By high school Rickey was directing music videos on Chicago’s South Side. As an undergrad at Bowdoin College (Brunswick, ME) Rickey competed in varsity football & varsity track while balancing a double major in African-American Literature and Political Theory. As a senior his film SURVIVIES (a 45-minute documentary tracking the days leading up to Ivies, Bowdoin’s annual April bash) was inducted into the Bowdoin College Historical Archive.
Upon graduation in 2015 he joined HBO as an Executive Assistant in Programming where he supported Creative Executives until early 2019 on shows such as VEEP, BARRY, SILICON VALLEY, INSECURE, LOS ESPOOKYS, A BLACK LADY SKETCH SHOW and GAME OF THRONES. In addition to his work at HBO, Rickey assisted Mark Romanek on JAY-Z’s music video THE STORY OF OJ and in association with Psycho Films produced the short film LA PETITE MORT, a 2019 Official Selection of Beverly Hills Film Festival and HollyShorts Film Festival.
Most recently, Rickey supported Courtney Lilly as a Showrunner’s Assistant on BLACK-ISH (Season Six) and he’s now a Staff Writer on GROWN-ISH (Season Four).
This film is intended to be a lighthearted ode to black love and my personal discovery that a relationship built on a shaky foundation cannot last. Last Fall, I struggled to complete this project as I was losing confidence in the story because I was still hurt by the inciting events that motivated me to write and direct this short. I decided to take a break and attended a picnic thrown by a group of black women, with a few black men in attendance.
We enjoyed each other’s company all afternoon when the inevitable topic of dating in Los Angeles arose, specifically the theme of Black Love. Many questions and concerns came from shared personal experiences and upon further interrogation we found a lot of failed relationships, most of which were preceded by a significant lack of communication. We also discovered a divide in how the expression of love is perceived by the different genders and how today’s black male understanding of what love looks like is overshadowed or sometimes ignored. Yet, we all agreed black bodies have been sexualized to a point of obsession in art and cinema, while the study of black love has proven to be far more elusive.
After the picnic, I realized my artistic voice is absent from the discussion of black love and I needed to find a subversive way to join the conversation. I now believe, like filmmakers before me, my work is relevant to the conversation and interrogation of the phenomenon known as “the meaning of love.” Thus, I am the right person to tell this story and there’s no better time than now because relatable stories, like my short film, are happening every day and young, black lovers want to talk about what it means to us.
