The Dutchman is a dynamic and psychologically visceral modern on-screen adaption of the iconic play written in the height of the civil rights movement in the United States of America by playwright Amiri Baraka in 1964 about 2 people on a train with societal consequences and far more. Since then, it has evolved into a play as part of American literary and pop-culture. I had the opportunity to watch this film before it’s USA cinema release in 2026, which deals with class, race, discrimination, equality, privilege, identity which unfortunately still play a massive role in society in the story of a black man in the United States of America and prejudice regardless of his standing and perceived success and a sharp reminder of the societal obstacles that still ring true today. The Dutchman proves that this story is still very relevant today 62 years after the original play was written by Amiri Baraka. It tells the story of a successful upstanding African American business man Clay played by the always brilliant Andre Holland whose marriage is falling apart after his wife Kaya’s (Zazie Beetz) Affair. They seek counselling and go to regular therapy sessions but the therapist who hosts the sessions seems to know far more about Clay then is comfortable. One night in a New York subway Clay is on his way to a party to support a close friend (Aldis Hodge), he meets the mysterious, untamed, feral-like and alluring Lula whom Clay has a sexual encounter with. The consequences of that encounter make Clay have to face up to his past, present and future as he not only has to fight for his reputation, his life but also his actual soul, as Lula whose played by Kate Mara with menace slithers into parts of his life he did not expect and starts causing visceral disruption. Andre Holland and Kate Mara who were both producers on The Dutchman have really good on screen chemistry as the antagonist and protagonist respectively. It really becomes interesting when the atmosphere becomes very uncomfortable as their dynamic evolves through Clay’s journey and adapts to the different environments they find themselves in, and the danger escalates in ways the original play does not as events take place outside the New York City Subway setting. Director and Producer-Andre Gaines does an excellent job of keeping the original premise of the play’s central protagonist and antagonist of Clay and Lula front and centre even amongst the chaos of the modern setting and some surrealism aspects, I felt there were a lot of subtle nods to Adam and Eve with Lula holding the red apple, the sign of the forbidden fruit and temptation in the lore.
Rogue Pictures and Inaugural Entertainments Official Synopsis of The Dutchman :
| Rogue Pictures and Inaugural Entertainment Present A Cinemation Studios Production André Holland, Kate Mara, Zazie Beetz, Aldis Hodge, Stephen McKinley Henderson Screenplay by Qasim Basir, Andre Gaines Based on the play Dutchman by Amiri Baraka, Producer Jonathan T. Baker, Produced By Andre Gaines, Directed by Andre Gaines Official 2026 Selection |
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| Clay (André Holland), a successful but troubled black businessman, attends therapy sessions with his wife, Kaya, in an attempt to salvage their marriage. But their mysterious therapist is not all that he seems, and begins to unexpectedly appear to Clay outside of their sessions. On a New York subway train, Clay encounters Lula, a seductive but sinister white stranger who slowly begins to unravel his life. Clay must discover the truth behind this encounter to get back to his wife, heal his fractured soul, and survive the night. In this psychological thriller – a modern adaptation of the 1964 Obie Award winning play – The Dutchman brings a contemporary edge to the original, exploring themes of race and identity in America. Facebook:@thedutchmanmoviehttps://www.facebook.com/thedutchmanmovie IG:@thedutchmanmoviehttps://www.instagram.com/thedutchmanmovie/ |
For Andre Gaines this collaboration with Andre Holland was a long time coming as the two had attended (NYU) New York University together years ago and became friends, the involvement of Kate Mara as the antagonist and introducing Aldis Hodge and Zazie Beetz’s new original characters to The Dutchman story at the South by Southwest Film Festival last year. The cast and crew were in attendance to talk about The Dutchman below are some of the quotes from their interview with Collider, the full interview is on their website https://collider.com/ (Read Below)
ANDRE GAINES:
‘Dutchman was a play in 1964 written by Amiri Baraka. At the time, his name was LeRoi Jones, and it was the seminal play that launched the Black Arts movement in the ’60s. This was a group of poets and playwrights that had come together and essentially launched a new arts renaissance that birthed its way out of Harlem. Amiri Baraka is really credited as being the founder and godfather of that. The play Dutchman not only launched that movement but launched his career and has been this seminal Obie Award-winning play for 60 years. It was really a great opportunity to be able to bring it to the screen.‘
‘It’s really just part of being a producer, pursuing rights for something that you want to make. I just don’t ever give up on it, so this was well over six years of pursuing these rights. What ended up happening, a sort of wonderful coincidence, is that the Baraka family, because Amiri Baraka had passed away in 2014, had actually seen the premiere for one of my other films, a documentary called The One and Only Dick Gregory that premiered at Tribeca Film Festival in 2021. I didn’t know they were in the audience. I found out afterwards, and they put two and two together. They wanted to talk to me, and I said, “This is what I want to do with this film,” and they said yes.‘
ANDRÉ HOLLAND:
‘I saw a bunch of your work, as well, man, (Andre Gaines) and I’ve always admired it. I’m a big believer in community and creating community. I feel like we were very fortunate to be a part of that ecosystem at NYU, where a lot of people were doing really interesting work. I’m glad that this is an extension of that, so thank you for your kind words, and thank you for having me.‘
‘I just want to send some love to you, (Kate), because in the play, Clay often gets the credit because he has a big explosive monologue at the end, but it’s really Lula who’s driving the action. It’s her play all the way up until the very end. I think it takes an extraordinarily gifted artist to be able to carry that with such specificity and beauty, and girl, you killed it!‘
KATE MARA:
‘That’s such a nice compliment. I was lucky because André was already attached as Clay. I did not go to drama school; I don’t know very many plays. I was a musical theater nerd, but I’m not very educated in the world of plays, so I was not familiar with Dutchman, but I was very familiar with André Holland’s work. So, when it was offered to me, I was just excited to get the opportunity to work with him. Then I read the script and was terrified, but I decided to say yes. That’s how I became involved. It was really just because I was so excited to work with André Holland.‘
‘Obviously, she’s been played many times before since it was a well-known play. It just took a lot of preparation, and I did a lot of things that I’ve really never done before to prepare for a role, which was really fun. I really worked for a while leading up to the actual filming. Once we actually got to set, it was really all about connecting with André and just finding our rhythm together. It was really just all about… I don’t really want to give specifics because it’s all just embarrassing actor things, but there’s animal work involved, and she is a hyena, so there was a lot of hyena talk in my house with my kids with stuff like that. That’s as much as I’ll give you.’
ZAZIE BEETZ:
‘What our characters provide is an opportunity for context of where Clay is at. Also, the character is older in the script than he is in the play, which I think does change elements of it. We provide a little bit more of, like, why would a man like him, who does seem to have it all together, fall apart so dramatically? I felt like, for my character Kaya, my whole thing was the focus of our relationship. André Holland and Gaines talked a lot about our backstory, how our characters got to where we got to, and how that informs his relationship with Lula, and my involvement in partaking in that. I was fitting into the structure of the play where Kaya would come into, as well.‘
ALDIS HODGE:
‘I’m piggybacking off of that because that’s exactly it. She hit it on the head. We basically represent challenges in Clay’s journey. I think the introduction of those characters and what they represent today helps clarify, especially for this audience, some of those things that we’re going through because a lot of us in our own right are on a very similar journey as Clay and can’t really see it. The thing I love about our characters, and particularly with Kaya, that I enjoy is that relationship, as an audience member, forces me to ask about the specificity of complexity in terms of what they’re dealing with, what they’re going through. It’s played so beautifully by the two of them because it makes one think, “What is right? What is wrong? What does compromise actually look like? As one is finding himself through this all, what do you do? Do you choose yourself, or do you choose the issue? Do you choose the person in front of you? How do you choose the right answer?’
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