Kiersey Clemons continues to rise up the ranks in Hollywood, after starring in a pair of DC films and the MonsterVerse series, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, and also standing out in crowd-pleasing indie flicks like Dope and Susie Searches. It’s no surprise, then, that she’s got her own starring vehicle that has finally reached the masses after stirring up buzz at SXSW.
From writer-director Tayarisha Poe, The Young Wife is now available on digital and is the perfect date-night flick for couples… who don’t want a typical date-night flick. Just as 500 Days of Summer is self-described by its narrator as “not a love story, but a story about love,” Clemons has gone on the record and called her artistic new drama an “anti-wedding wedding movie.” Watch as her titular heroine Celestina navigates overbearing friends, family, and coworkers — all the while trying not to spiral on emotional, mental, and physical levels.
It all happens over the course of one afternoon at the wedding venue, and there are undoubtedly many newlyweds and millennials out there who will relate to Celestina’s trials and tribulations in the beautifully chaotic feature film. We recently caught up with Clemons and Poe in a paired interview to learn more about past movies that influenced The Young Wife, Clemons’ future projects, and why Poe isn’t worried that her significant other will take this sometimes-disastrous tale the wrong way.
The Young Wife: ‘So Beyond the Wedding’
The Young Wife
4/5
On her wedding day, all that stands between a young woman (Kiersey Clemons, DOPE) and marital bliss with her soon-to-be husband (singer/songwriter Leon Bridges) is surviving the chaos and expectations of family and friends, each intensifying her spiraling panic
- Release Date
- May 31, 2024
- Director
- Tayarisha Poe
- Runtime
- 1h 37m
- Writers
- Tayarisha Poe
- Studio(s)
- FilmNation Entertainment , Archer Gray
With a title like The Young Wife, you might already be tipped off that something might be amiss with the lead character. Is she committing too early to these lifelong vows? Clemons, however, had her own thoughts on how the movie has been promoted to the public thus far. “I would have preferred if we made the public think that it was about what it’s actually about, which is this woman having an existential crisis,” said Clemons, adding:
You’re in this place of, ‘Wait, what’s happening? Is the world going to end at the end? Like, are they all gonna die at the end? What’s happening? Is she sick? Does she have a terminal illness?’ It’s really so beyond the wedding.
And some of the best wedding movies are, in fact, about much more than the couple exchanging vows and taking each other’s hands for a lovely dance. Some past classic films might come to mind while watching The Young Wife, and filmmaker Tayarisha Poe was most inspired by one of them. “I was totally so influenced by Melancholia, which I think is like the best wedding movie, because that’s kind of what weddings are like, where you’re like, ‘There are so many other things that we need to be thinking about.’ There’s so much stuff,” Poe told us, in reference to Lars Von Trier’s 2011 film. She added:
“For so many people who get married between the ages of like 27 and 32, which we all know is when, like, you’re becoming an actual adult, there’s all this stuff happening — and then you have to get married.
I just think
Melancholia
so perfectly illustrated for me how the spectacle of weddings feel
.”
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Tayarisha Poe Encourages You to Paint Your Own Emotions
Poe continued to detail the unique way in which The Young Wife can impact viewers on an emotional level. “The movie’s so expressionistic. You get to paint your own emotion on to the emotions that we’re giving you, which is kind of freeing in a way. I feel like, so often, studios are giving us movies that are like, ‘A happens, and then B and then C and then D.’ Oh my god,” groaned Poe. She elaborated:
“So it felt really freeing to make something where we’re trying to just communicate emotion. And then,
as the viewer, you get to attach the emotion and bring your whole, like, encyclopedia of emotional definitions to it
. It feels awesome, for me as a viewer of the movie. It feels very free.”
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In Praise of Sheryl Lee Ralph
Alongside Clemons in her new film are a handful of other acclaimed performers, including Emmy winner Sheryl Lee Ralph (Abbott Elementary), playing Clemons’ rather intense mother. “Sheryl definitely has the energy that is: When she walks into the room, it’s her room. And I mean that in the best way possible,” Clemons told us. She continued:
“She’s so kind and gracious and regal. And I mean, she gave me advice, as I was just dealing with being the Black girl that’s the lead of this movie and the other things that just come with that — work dynamics and all of those things. And so I really was more so learning from watching her handle herself and her boundaries, and the way that she demands respect in such a way that… she’s not saying anything to make it happen. It’s just her energy.”
How Personal Is The Young Wife?
Given the tough conversations Clemons and Ralph’s characters have, as well as the tough-love words exchanged between Celestina and her husband-to-be River (Leon Bridges) in The Young Wife, we were curious if Poe, in real life, was ever nervous that her other half might look at the script and/or finished product and be rubbed the wrong way at all. “It’s honestly not really based on us,” Poe said. “It doesn’t feel that personal to me. But at the same time, obviously, of course, it’s going to feel personal… [My partner’s] just been there the whole time. Like, he was there before I wrote the movie.” She added:
“I think I’m more curious what my family and my in-laws, in seeing it, how that will feel because I think they will see themselves, even though I don’t see them… My first film was about a teenager who sells drugs at a boarding school. And I went to boarding school, and at all the [press] interviews, they were like, ‘Oh my god, this is your life?’ And I was like, ‘No, that’s not me!'”
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Kiersey Clemons on the Vanished Zorro and Superhero Movies
Looking at Clemons’ filmography and her reported projects in the works, one might recall that she was signed on to star in the Zorro remake Z back in 2018. “I hadn’t thought about it in a long time, and the other day, I was like, ‘I was supposed to be in Zorro!‘” she told us, in thinking about the project’s future. “I have no idea, to be honest. I should ask somebody. I have bad luck with superhero movies… What I will say is: If it happens, I would be so excited… I love the story and the role.”
Clemons, who has also starred as Iris West in two DC films (Justice League and The Flash), continued to explain her love for that realm of cinema:
“I do enjoy being a part of these, like, big worlds because of the fan base. They get so excited, and I think that’s really cool. I’m honestly not a part of any type of fandom for anything or anyone like that… It’s like an inner child thing. I feel like that stays alive when you’re into that, and I admire that.
I love going to Comic-Con. I love meeting everybody. I think that the ones that I’m signed on to right now will probably be it
. I will enjoy them while I’m here, for sure.”
From Republic Pictures, The Young Wife was released May 31, 2024, on demand and digital platforms like Google Play, Prime Video, Fandango at Home, and on Apple TV through the link below:
Watch The Young Wife
