Following its Sundance premiere, Phyllis Nagy’s timely historical drama “Call Jane” has found a home. A press release has announced that Roadside Attractions has acquired U.S. distribution rights to the film, with plans for a fall 2022 theatrical release.
Featuring an all-star ensemble including Elizabeth Banks, Sigourney Weaver, Kate Mara, and Wunmi Mosaku, “Call Jane” is inspired by the real-life Jane Collective, an underground abortion network run by women in pre-Roe v. Wade Chicago. After being denied a life-saving abortion by an all-male medical board, Banks’ character, Joy, is able to terminate her pregnancy with the help of the Janes. She ends up joining the collective and, along with the other activists, dedicates her life to providing safe abortions to women who need them, breaking the law and risking her freedom to do so.
Nagy helmed the pic, while Hayley Schore and Roshan Sethi penned the script.
“My hope is that ‘Call Jane’ surprises people, that it in some way confounds preconceived ideas audiences might have about what a narrative that deals with women’s rights, with choice, and particularly with abortion, can be,” Nagy told us. “To make one person’s thinking shift in even a tiny way would delight me.”
“Phyllis Nagy’s brilliant film is inspiring, fierce, and so relevant for our times,” said Roadside Attractions’ Co-Presidents Howard Cohen and Eric d’Arbeloff. “Elizabeth Banks, in a powerful and moving performance, along with the masterful Sigourney Weaver, lead an extraordinary cast to deliver an unforgettable story of women who challenge the power structure to support one another and do what they think is right.”
“The Janes,” Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes’ documentary about the Jane Collective, also premiered at Sundance and will be released by HBO. The Janes were also the subject of Rachel Carey’s 2018 narrative drama “Ask for Jane.”
Nagy received an Oscar nomination for writing “Carol.” She previously directed the HBO film “Mrs. Harris.” Banks was last seen in “Mrs. America,” while Weaver’s recent credits include “Ghostbusters: Afterlife.” Mara counts “A Teacher” among her more recent projects, and Mosaku starred in last year’s “Loki.”
