Following a world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, HBO will premiere the new film adaptation of Richard Wright's book Native Son April 6. Directed by acclaimed visual artist Rashid Johnson from a screenplay by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Suzan-Lori Parks (Topdog/Underdog), the drama stars Ashton Sanders (Moonlight) as a young African-American living in Chicago.
In Native Son, Bigger Thomas (Sanders) is hired as a chauffeur for affluent businessman Will Dalton, played by Emmy-nominated actor Bill Camp (The Night Of). As Thomas enters this seductive new world of money and power—including a precarious relationship with Dalton’s daughter, Mary (Margaret Qualley, HBO’s The Leftovers)—he faces unforeseen choices and perilous circumstances that will alter the course of his life forever.
The cast also includes Nick Robinson, KiKi Layne, Elizabeth Marvel, David Alan Grier, and Sanaa Lathan.
Native Son is an HBO Films presentation in association with A24 that is executive-produced by Stephanie Meurer and produced by Matthew Perniciaro and Michael Sherman of Bow and Arrow Entertainment.