Philly woman brings Obamas' love story to Sundance

The Sundance Film Festival's awards, announced on Saturday, were dominated by Nate Parker's The Birth of a Nation, the story of Nat Turner's slave rebellion that won both the Grand Jury Prize and the audience award. But another, less bloody take on the African American experience made waves in Park City as well: Southside With You, which follows a Chicago lawyer and her summer associate who just happen to be the future Barack and Michelle Obama on the course of their first date.

At the film's world premiere, Tika Sumpter, who plays Southside's then-Michelle Robinson, said she pushed to get the movie made because "I wanted to see a love story about people who look like me" - a point that had special resonance in a week where the movie industry's diversity crisis was making new headlines every day. But it also posed an implicit question: Does a sweet, wistful story about two black people have to involve the future First Couple in order to get made?

"Theoretically, no, of course not," said Carrie Holt de Lama, the Old City resident who served as one of Southside's executive producers, as well as its unit production manager. "It could be anybody. But at the same time, I don't know if the love story would have taken off as well if it wasn't about the president and the first lady. Probably, realistically, no."

Holt de Lama, a lifelong Chicagoan, moved to Philadelphia with her husband, former Chicago Tribune managing editor George de Lama, when he was named president of the Eisenhower Fellowships.

But she still has deep roots in her hometown, and helped secure locations that evoked the Chicago of 1989, not to mention a stand-in for Obama's battered Datsun. "That was hard," she says. "Most of them are in Iraq or the Middle East."

Holt de Lama was in Park City for the film's world premiere and warm reception from a vocally appreciative crowd that included Empire's Jussie Smollett. Talks for theatrical distribution are ongoing, but no deal or release date has been announced.

Southside With You, which was written and directed by Richard Tanne, mixes fact with a sprinkling of legend. The couple did visit the Art Institute of Chicago on their first date, but it was Tanne who installed an exhibition of the black painter Ernie Barnes that prompts Barack to reflect on the importance of Good Times and a joint recitation of Gwendolyn Brooks' "We Real Cool." (Unable to shut down the real gallery for two days of shooting, Holt de Lama secured the Chicago Cultural Center, where the Obamas would later host their wedding reception.)

As they stroll through the city, taking in an impromptu African drum concert in the park and dropping in on a neighborhood meeting where Barack shows off his community organizing skills, the two engaged in sometimes pointed discussions about the tension between individual success and broader responsibilities. What is Michelle, a former legal aid attorney, doing defending corporate clients at a white shoe law firm? And why has Barack left behind local activism for Harvard Law? Although the movie never winks at the Obamas' future occupations, their conversation converges on the desire to make an impact that often propels people toward public service.

The concern going into Southside With You was that it would lie somewhere between fanfiction and propaganda. In the Guardian, critic Jordan Hoffman quipped, "Films glorifying sitting leaders is a little more North Korea's bag."

That's true even for those who don't share Obama's political leanings: The conservative New York Post critic Kyle Smith observed, "This is Obama the bridge builder, not the flamethrower he turned out to be." There's a hint of the future politician in the scene where he and Michelle emerge from a screening of Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing and run into one of their law firm's white partners, who proclaims how mad the film's ending made him and asks their opinion. Barack diplomatically suggests that Lee's character throws a trash can through the window of Sal's Famous in order to turn the Bed-Stuy mob's anger toward property damage rather than the pizzeria's white owners - a bogus explanation, but good enough to soothe the partner's anger.

But for Holt de Lama, Southside With You's politics is entirely personal. "I'm a romantic," she said. "What I loved about the script is it's truly a love story - an amazing love story that happened to involve the leader of the free world. But it really spoke to me in terms of that excitement of your first love."