A24 Acquires Global Distribution Rights for Jordan Firstman’s Club Kid
American studio A24 invested $17 million in May to acquire global distribution rights for the feature film Club Kid, parismatch.com reported. The tragicomic feature film follows a thirty-something gay man who burns through his life with drugs and dance floors before learning he has a young son. Jordan Firstman wrote, directed, and starred in the project, which is scheduled for release on November 4.
Festival Success and Oscar Aspirations Ahead of Release
The film earned a warm reception on the festival circuit prior to its commercial release. Club Kid played at the Festival de Cannes, where it drew laughter and tears from audiences, and subsequently captured both the Grand Prix and the Public Prize at the Festival de Deauville. Industry observers project the feature will make a strong run toward the upcoming Academy Awards. I think it’s going to take me a while to get over this. We could expect anything except this,
Firstman told parismatch.com while on an international promotional tour.
Firstman conceived the feature as a departure from cynical storytelling. At the point I was in my life, I wanted to talk about hope, change, another light. But above all, to be less cynical,
he explained to parismatch.com. The filmmaker drew stylistic inspiration from Martin Scorsese’s After Hours alongside 1980s Hollywood dramatic comedies to shape the New York-centric narrative.
Independent Cinema Commitments and Forthcoming Voice Work
To preserve his creative vision, Firstman trimmed his own salary so the production could shoot on physical film stock rather than digital. He deliberately avoided an insular niche format. I wanted my film to be a synthesis between pure auteur cinema and more popular films,
he noted to parismatch.com. He defends his taste for American independent cinema, citing Sean Baker, Andrea Arnold, Olivier Assayas (with whom he dreams of working) or Agnès Varda as references. His career trajectory shifted in 2020 during pandemic lockdowns when his Instagram video series Impressions achieved global reach. He has often played his own role in his queer short films as well as in the trashy American-Mexican film Rotting in the Sun and has appeared in the series Miss Marvel and I Love LA.
Firstman also signed on to voice the American-release version of the French queer animated feature Jim Queen, a project he discovered at Cannes. Discussing the current landscape for queer cinema, he told parismatch.com that his cohort of filmmakers does not frame their work around explicit social demands. We don’t claim anything, but our number reinforces our influence on current international cinema,
he said.
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