Based on Tarell Alvin McCraney’s unproduced semi-biographical stage play titled In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue, Moonlight follows Chiron (played by three different actors as the character ages), a member of more than one minority. The story ultimately reveals that Chiron is at the least sexually questioning and who ultimately is shown exploring a gay relationship, something that perhaps makes him a shunned quasi-minority within his own general racial minority.
Tarell Alvin McCraney first wrote the stage play in 2003 as a way to cope with his mother’s death from AIDS. It was shelved for about a decade before filmmaker Barry Jenkins (whose only other feature film at the time was 2008's Medicine for Melancholy) came across it through the Borscht arts collective in Miami, Florida, and decided it was going to be his next film.
After having its world premiere at the Telluride Film Festival on September 2nd, 2016, Moonlight was released in select theaters on October 21st before beginning a wide release on November 2nd where it earned unanimous acclaim from critics. On February 26th, 2017, it won 3 Academy Awards for Best Picture (after La La Land was accidentally crowned the winner), Best Supporting Actor (Mahershala Ali), and Best Adapted Screenplay (Barry Jenkins & Tarell Alvin McCraney). Moonlight also became the first film with an all-black cast and the subject of LGBT to have won the Oscar for Best Picture.
After having its world premiere at the Telluride Film Festival on September 2nd, 2016, Moonlight was released in select theaters on October 21st before beginning a wide release on November 2nd where it earned unanimous acclaim from critics. On February 26th, 2017, it won 3 Academy Awards for Best Picture (after La La Land was accidentally crowned the winner), Best Supporting Actor (Mahershala Ali), and Best Adapted Screenplay (Barry Jenkins & Tarell Alvin McCraney). Moonlight also became the first film with an all-black cast and the subject of LGBT to have won the Oscar for Best Picture.