Casting News

Deutschlands: Carla Juri, Craig Robinson & Markees Christmas Aren’t Foreign to Hartigan’s “Morris From America”

Published on July 23, 2015

Wurst and sauerkraut appear to be served up with hip hop beats in Chad Hartigan’s sophomore film currently in the closing stages of production. Deadline confirms that breakout Sundance actress Carla Juri (Wetlands), funnyman Craig Robinson and newcomer teen Markees Christmas topline Morris from America. Lina Keller, Jakub Gierszal, Eva Löbau and Levin Henning co-star in the romantic drama being produced by Sara Murphy (Land Ho!), Adele Romanski (Black Rock), Martin Heisler and Gabriele Simon. Lichtblick Media GMBH and Beachside Films are co-producing the pic with Michael B. Clark and Alex Turteltaub executive producing.

Gist: This is a coming-of-age tale about a 13-year-old hip-hop-loving American boy Morris (Christmas) who moves to Heidelberg with his father (Robinson) and is forced to navigate the trials and tribulations of adolescence in a foreign place. Juri plays Morris’ German tutor and chief confidant.

Worth Noting: We raved about Carla Juri two Sundance editions ago in her delightful and effervescent performance in Wetlands. We’re curious to see her here.

Do We Care?: Having produced the highly enjoyable Land Ho!, Murphy appears to have found a possible winning Euro-Americano formula.

Eric Lavallée

Eric Lavallée is the founder, CEO, editor-in-chief, film journalist and critic at IONCINEMA.com (founded in 2000). Eric is a regular at Sundance, Cannes and TIFF. He has a BFA in Film Studies at the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema. In 2013 he served as a Narrative Competition Jury Member at the SXSW Film Festival. He was an associate producer on Mark Jackson's This Teacher (2018 LA Film Festival, 2018 BFI London). In 2022 he served as a New Flesh Comp for Best First Feature at the 2022 Fantasia Intl. Film Festival. Current top films for 2022 include Tár (Todd Field), All That Breathes (Shaunak Sen), Aftersun (Charlotte Wells).