Writer-director Channing Godfrey Peoples’ feature directorial debut, “Miss Juneteenth,” follows a former beauty queen, working-class, African American, single mother named Turquoise (Nicole Beharie), who wants nothing more than for her daughter to also wear the crown.
Offering an atypical perspective of a beauty pageant, the film unfolds against the background of the Miss Juneteenth procession, named after the Juneteenth holiday, which commemorates when the last enslaved people in the United States were emancipated in 1865.For many young Black women, the Miss Juneteenth pageant is their version of the more recognized Miss America.
And for “Miss Juneteenth,” which foregrounds the story of a woman rarely given this much screen consideration, Beharie didn’t need to seek inspiration in prior films or performances.
She simply had to focus her attention on the world around her and observe.“I always think life is more interesting for inspiration, unless I literally shoplift or something like that,
Read full article