Chinonye Chukwu’s Till will receive the Stanley Kramer Award during the 2023 Producer’s Guild Awards.
The United Artists and Orion Pictures movie will be presented with the annual honor on Feb. 25, 2023, at The Beverly Hilton, the guild announced Monday.
“This team fought for years to see Mamie Till-Mobley’s story told on the big screen, venerating her legacy and the enduring love she had for her son, Emmett,” said PGA presidents Stephanie Allain and Donald De Line in a statement. “We are humbled and thrilled to bestow this award on a film that compassionately depicts the events, and mother-son bond, that sparked the Civil Rights Movement. Till inspires all of us to work towards realizing Mamie’s purpose, justice for her son Emmett and all those who have been harmed by hatred and prejudice.”
The movie is centered on Mamie Till-Mobley, the mother of Emmett Till, a 14-year-old boy who was kidnapped, tortured and murdered by white men in 1955 while visiting cousins in Mississippi. His death, and Till-Mobley’s relentless pursuit of justice for her son, galvanized the American Civil Rights Movement. Danielle Deadwyler stars as Till-Mobley in the biopic written by Michael Reilly, Keith Beauchamp and Chukwu. Producers include Beauchamp, Barbara Broccoli, Whoopi Goldberg, Thomas Levine, Michael Reilly and Frederick Zollo.
“We are very grateful to the Producers Guild for honoring our film Till with this prestigious award as Stanley Kramer was a visionary filmmaker whose films and life inspired us all,” producers Beauchamp, Broccoli, Goldberg, Levine, Reilly and Zollo said in a joint statement. “Our film honors the legacy of Mamie Till-Mobley and her son Emmett, and all of those who came before and after them who fight for the pursuit of justice here in the United States and around the world.”
Till is based on research conducted by documentarian Beauchamp, who had a relationship with Till-Mobley and Emmett’s cousin Simeon Wright, an eyewitness to the kidnapping and a consultant on the film before his passing in 2017. His work eventually helped get the U.S. Department of Justice to reopen the case around Emmett’s murder in 2004.
The Stanley Kramer Award was established in 2002 and honors a production, producer or other individuals whose achievements or contributions illuminate and raise public awareness of important social issues. Previous recipients include Rita Moreno, Jane Fonda, Get Out, Loving, Fruitvale Station, The Normal Heart, Bombshell, The Hunting Ground, An Inconvenient Truth and Hotel Rwanda.
Abbey White
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