

The Dutchman
Description
In this powerful reimagining of Amiri Baraka’s Obie-winning 1964 play, successful-but-troubled man about town Clay (Festival tributee André Holland) has an important evening ahead—a party launching the political campaign of his friend Warren (Aldis Hodge)—when he meets a tempestuous woman named Lula (Kate Mara) on the subway. Both Clay and Lula have demons—he’s in marriage therapy and she’s a racial provocateur who threatens to upend his life. Baraka’s seminal and disturbing work addresses racial and sexual polarities between Black men and white women and Gaines’s update suggests that society—and Black men in particular—needs to push past and through the play’s dynamics in order to heal. Stephen McKinley Henderson as therapist Dr. Amiri (note the name!) and Atlanta’s Zazie Beets as Clay’s wife Kaya are memorable in supporting roles, but it’s Mara and Holland who faceoff fearlessly and unforgettably in Gaines’s coruscating film. —Rod Armstrong
Attendee Information
André Holland will also be at the 2025 SFFILM Festival for our Centerpiece screening of Love, Brooklyn where he will join us for a special pre-screening tribute conversation.

Hailing from Toledo, OH, Andre Gaines studied journalism and chemistry at Northwestern University before getting his MFA in dramatic writing at Tisch School of the Arts. Through his company Cinemation Studios, he has produced a number of films including Da Sweet Blood of Jesus (2014) and Bill Nye: Science Guy (2017). He made his directing debut with the documentary The One and Only Dick Gregory (2021), followed by two more documentaries, After Jackie (2022) and Triumph: Jesse Owens and the Berlin Olympics (2024). The Dutchman is his narrative debut.
Film Details
LanguageEnglish
Year2025
Runtime94
CountryUSA
DirectorAndre Gaines
Executive ProducerCassian Elwes, Lauren Dandridge Gaines, Peter Graham, Joshua Blum, Devon Libran
WriterAndre Gaines
EditorJoel Viertel
CinematographerFrankie Demarco
MusicDaniel Hart
CastAndré Holland, Kate Mara, Zazie Beetz
Print SourceWME
Closed CaptionsClosed Captions are confirmed for this film
Audio DescriptionAudio Descriptions are not currently confirmed for this film
American Sign Language (ASL) InterpretationAmerican Sign Language Interpretation is not currently scheduled for this film