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Meet your new favorite anti-heroine: Selah Summers (Lovie Simone), the dominant, intelligent, furious protagonist of “Selah and The Spades,” Tayarisha Poe’s feature directorial debut. Selah leads the most powerful underground clique at the prestigious Haldwell boarding school. Since Haldwell’s teachers and administrators are basically useless, Selah essentially runs the entire school, too.
Selah and her fellow Spades — second-in-command Maxxie (Jharrel Jerome) and Selah’s chosen successor, Paloma (Celeste O’Connor) — take care of their classmates’ recreational drug needs. Haldwell’s other factions cover the student body’s other vices, such as gambling and cheating. The cliques know what they’re doing is morally dubious — even flat-out wrong — and don’t care.
Some of the kids, like Bobby (Ana Mulvoy Ten), another faction leader, are spoiled, entitled, used to having the system work in their favor. But for Selah, presiding over Haldwell is her way of finding and wielding her own power. She’s all too aware that women’s lives aren’t really their own; their autonomy is constantly challenged, weakened, and harnessed. So, as she reveals in a passionate monologue, she’ll seize influence and control wherever she can, however she can. And if someone crosses her, she’ll make sure they regret it.
Poe herself attended a boarding school, an experience she’s described as “incredibly specific and fascinatingly odd.” As she told Women and Hollywood, she “wanted to capture the essence of that experience” with “Selah and The Spades,” “while also crafting a story that was filled with kids who looked like me and who did — to be frank — whatever the fuck they wanted to do.”
She added, “I wanted to write a story starring a bunch of kids of color who were limited only by themselves. I wanted them to be powerful and dangerous and larger than life.”
And truly, one of the most joyful aspects of “Selah and The Spades” is seeing its many young characters of color living their lives on their own terms. Outside Haldwell, Selah has to answer to her impossible-to-please mother and the restrictions the world forces upon women of color. But in school, she’s the one calling the shots.
Depending on the scene, “Selah and The Spades” can feel like a dreamy fairy tale; in others, it seems like a darker spin on “Clueless,” which Poe has cited as one of her favorite films, or “Mean Girls.” No matter how you categorize it, the world of Selah, The Spades, and Haldwell is one you’ll want to return to. Luckily, there’s an Amazon series about Selah and Co. in the works.
“Selah and The Spades” is now streaming on Amazon Prime.
