Loving - Interview with Joel Edgerton and Ruth Negga

Ruth Negga and Joel Edgerton in, Loving

Loving is a new film directed and written by Jeff Nichols. It stars Joel Edgerton and Ruth Negga as Richard and Mildred Loving, the plaintiffs in the 1967 U.S. Supreme Court decision Loving v. Virginia, which invalidated state laws prohibiting interracial marriage. 

The film follows the courtship and marriage of Mildred Jeter, a black woman, and Richard Loving, a white man. They are arrested and sentenced to prison in Virginia in 1958, because their interracial marriage violates the state's anti-miscegenation laws. Exiled to Washington, D.C., they sue the state of Virginia in a series of proceedings leading to the Supreme Court's unanimous decision in Loving v. Virginia, which holds that laws prohibiting interracial marriage are unconstitutional.

Joel Edgerton and Ruth Negga are absolutely outstanding in the film and could very well land themselves Oscar nominations. While movie goers have become familiar with Joel Edgerton over the last few years (The Gift, Black Mass) audiences will recognize the actress for her supporting role in the sci-fi feature Warcraft and her starring role as Tulip O’Hare on AMC’s Preacher, which was recently renewed for another season. But with Loving, and the early Oscar buzz around her performance, she is on the verge of a whole other level of stardom. For her, the subject of the movie was highly personal. When she was around four, she moved with her family from Ethiopia to Ireland. County Limerick was more pastoral than suburban then, and Negga says she deeply identifies with Mildred’s sense of connection to a place. 

I spoke with Joel and Ruth  and director Jeff Nichols during the Toronto International Film Festival where the LOVING was embraced by moviegoers and critics.

Please click the links below to watch the interviews.