Tuesday, March 19, 2013

New Orleans Film About James Booker Sets SXSW Festival on Fire

Bayou Maharajah Trailer from Lily Keber on Vimeo.

New Orleans filmmaker Lily Keber's film Bayou Maharajah, about James Booker, "the best black, gay, one-eyed junkie piano genius New Orleans has ever produced," premiered this week at SXSW film festival in Austin Texas, and has already been generating excitement.

The trailer for the film was featured on RollingStone.com. The film’s poster debuted on IndieWire. The Hollywood Reporter named the film the #1 Must See Music Movie of SXSW 2013. PASTE Magazine called Bayou Maharajah the #2 Must See Movie at SXSW. Billboard Magazine mentioned Bayou Maharajah in three separate articles, including an extensive profile featuring interviews with Harry Connick, Jr., Joe Boyd, Scott Billington, Don Williams, and director Lily Keber. Variety Magazine listed the film first in their Searching For The Next Sugarman article and featured a picture from the film as the headlining photograph. Out Magazine listed Bayou Maharajah as the top Most Notable LGBT film to see at SXSW and featured a still from the film as the headlining photograph. A longer article for Rolling Stone followed.

Interviews with Director/Producer Lily Keber were featured on Austin Fox-7’s Morning News Show, KOOP’s Writing On The Air, efilmcritic.com, nola.com, and OffBeat Magazine. The Austin-American Statesman called the film “ecstatic, sorrowful, beautiful, pained, full of anger, joy and something otherworldly.”

Bayou Maharajah has also been profiled on NPR’s Weekend Edition, NOLA Defender, The Vinyl District, Larry Blumenfeld’s Blu Notes, Sal Nunziato’s Burning Wood blog, Alex Rawl’s My Spilt Milk. Roger Ebert has tweeted about Bayou Maharajah twice.


It's always exciting when New Orleans culture receives some of the international recognition it deserves.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

And some of the film's financing came from small $10 donations of supporters!