Best known for her on-screen work in series such as “American Crime Story” and “Queen Sugar,” and in the 2019 big screen comedy “Little,” Noree Victoria is set to step behind the camera. She’s making her feature directorial debut with “An Arrangement,” “a psychological thriller marking the first produced film from TV writer Helen Shang,” per Deadline.
Currently shooting in Northern California, the pic “follows a politician’s wife whose drug addiction threatens to derail her husband’s gubernatorial campaign. Tensions rise when she is forced to secretly undergo rehab at the couple’s secluded summer home, and her husband’s interest in their unconventional nurse puts the couple’s marriage — and all of their lives — on the line,” the source teases.
Bel Deliá (“The Tangle”) toplines “An Arrangement” and is among its producers.
Victoria previously helmed the 2021 shorts “Fool Me Twice” and “Anja of Croatia.” She “served two terms as the first Black female Vice-Chair of NewFilmmakers Los Angeles and continues to serve on its Executive Board of Directors, with her first TV project as a writer recently being optioned,” Deadline details.
“If you choose this path, you have to decide to be the one that defies the odds. We make a life out of doing so,” Victoria emphasized in a 2021 interview. “If a person doesn’t believe their own odds, a more secure route might be ideal. But what is security? I am a woman. I am Black. I am from Baltimore. I did not inherit a ton of wealth. But I am scrappy and my dad instilled in me that I only had to follow the rules if the rules were fair. That gives me a tremendous sense of self-actualization to this day. It has also meant making space for myself and the people I love in a world that isn’t inherently fair. It’s working out. I’m still here, leaving every door I enter ajar for the next.”
Shang’s writing credits include “13 Reasons Why,” “Hannibal,” and “The Rings of Power,” Amazon’s upcoming “Lord of the Rings” series.
Check out a video of Victoria discussing the importance of representation and opening up access to the entertainment industry in a video below.
