Here’s a shocker: Parker Sawyers — who portrays Barack Obama in Southside with You — actually grew up in a Republican household.
In an interview with The Daily Beast’s Matt Wilstein, Sawyers discussed the new film about the Obamas’ first date, while also revealing details of his own Indiana childhood. “My parents were really good people,” he said, adding, “And I’m not saying Republicans aren’t. It wasn’t like we were like Republicans are today. I picked up a sense of duty to serve and to donate your time and money and take care of your neighbors and people you don’t even know. I learned that from my parents and they were Republicans.”
According to Sawyers, it was Obama’s campaign that convinced his family to transition to the Democratic Party. After reading Dreams from My Father, the actor reminisced how he had become a “fan,” “admirer,” “supporter” and even “mentee” of the 44th president of the United States.
Tika Sumpter — who portrayed Michelle Robinson — explained her admiration of the first lady to The New York Times, comparing Robinson’s struggles with discrimination in the law world to her own in the acting industry. “I’m not going to allow that to hold me back,” she explained. “Which is what I love about Michelle. She never allowed the color of her skin and all the things she was up against to keep her from breaking through.”
According to Pamela McClintock of The Hollywood Reporter, Southside with You has garnered “glowing reviews.” Awareness is high, helped by high-profile TV spots like George Stephanopoulos’ gushing interview of Sumpter and Sawyers on ABC’s Good Morning America. The film, which opens Friday, August 26, is anticipated to resonate especially well among those feeling “nostalgic” about the end of the Obama years.
“No matter where you stand on the political spectrum,” Time’s Stephanie Zacharek wrote, “you’re probably hard-pressed to think of a presidential first date you’d like to see dramatized onscreen.” Yet, according to Zacharek, writer-director Richard Tanne made “the best possible choice” in choosing the present first couple, whose “daylong romantic interlude” turns out to “shape the country’s future.” Indeed, to The New Yorker’s Richard Brody, the film is not only a “tender, intimate drama,” but one having the “grand resonance of a historical epic.”
While “tender” and “grand,” the movie is not political, Sawyers told USA Today. “There’s no policy in the movie. It’s literally about a guy trying to get a girl.” Rolling Stone’s Charles Bramesco agreed with the assessment. Southside with You leaves “politics out of the rambling and discursive conversations,” except for one scene, the writer opined. In it, Obama gives an eloquent speech to his church group which gives a “glimpse of the future leader he’ll become.”
The literal elephant in the room: would the media rave so fluently over a GOP love story?
