Trailer: "David Byrne's American Utopia" by Spike Lee

During its Broadway run, American Utopia drew acclaim both for its music, which covered the career of David Byrne, and its unorthodox staging. (You can get a sense of some of the live experience from an SNL clip from March.) The announcement of a filmed version of the show sparked excitement among many people; the news that Spike Lee would direct was cause for even more celebration.

Now, the first trailer for the film has been released. At IndieWire, Ryan Lattanzio offers some details on how David Byrne’s American Utopia will be distributed.

The film will kick off the 2020 Toronto International Film Festival next month, and will be available to watch via HBO and HBO Max on October 17.

David Byrne’s American Utopia isn’t the only high-profile film debuting at this year’s TIFF. The festival itself will adopt a hybrid model for screenings which will include both theatrical and digital showings of films. A number of screenings will make use of drive-in theater spaces as well.

Lee’s film will be joined at the festival by the likes of Halle Berry’s MMA drama Bruised, Regina King’s historically-minded One Night in Miami and Another Round, which reunites director Thomas Vinterberg with star Mads Mikkelsen.

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Tobias Carroll

Tobias Carroll lives and writes in New York City, and has been covering a wide variety of subjects — including (but not limited to) books, soccer and drinks — for many years. His writing has been published by the likes of the Los Angeles Times, Pitchfork, Literary Hub, Vulture, Punch, the New York Times and Men’s Journal. At InsideHook, he has…