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Whoopi Goldberg is slated to star in and produce the upcoming film Till, which depicts Mamie Till’s fight for justice for her 14-year-old son Emmett Till that was brutally killed by two racist White men in August of 1955 during a visit to Mississippi.
“We have waited a very long time to bring this historically necessary important film to people,” Goldberg said in a statement according to Variety. “And as we watch the repression of American History when it comes to people of color it makes it even that more important. I couldn’t be with better people: Fred, Barbara, Chinonye, Keith, Michael and Danielle.”
Goldberg will portray Till’s grandmother Alma Carthan. Mamie Till will be played by Danielle Deadwyler, known for her role in HBO’s Watchmen, The Haves & The Have Nots and P-Valley. The film will tell the story of how her grief led to her decision to allow her son’s tragic death be covered by the media. Till not only gave her son an open-casket funeral to show the horrific nature of his hate-fueled murder, but she also allowed photos from the funeral to be published in JET Magazine.
“It is a gift to learn the legacy and intimacies of our ancestors, those familial and communal, as is the life of Mamie Till-Mobley, a public leader and mother of the movement,” Deadwyler said about her upcoming role. “I am charged with humility and great will to embody her life at such an integral moment of personal tragedy and political rebellion, a boon to the civil rights movement, and to represent the joy in the love and life shared between Mamie Till and her beloved Emmett Till.”
The screenplay is being written by Chinonye Chukwu and is based on research done for Keith Beauchamp’s 2005 documentary, The Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till.
