Spike Lee, Nicholas Ma, and Clara Wu Tsai Debut Brooklyn Film Festival With BAM 

By Brooklyn Magazine

Spike Lee, Nicholas Ma, and New York Liberty Governor Clara Wu Tsai are bringing a new film festival to Brooklyn.

Playback: The Brooklyn Watch Party will take place on November 6 and 7 at BAM. The event will include screenings of repertory films by Lee and others, conversations with some of the borough’s most influential artists and filmmakers, pop-ups, and a street fair.

“With Playback, we are setting out to create a new kind of film festival—one that brings together people who share a love of storytelling through film,“ says Wu Tsai. “Spike has put Brooklyn on screen for decades, and BAM has served as the borough’s cultural hub for over a century. There is nowhere else like Brooklyn, nothing like the energy of this borough, and this festival will highlight all that makes our community unique.”

BAM, a co-presenter, was a natural fit for Playback.

“At BAM, we believe the arts are essential to a thriving civic life—bringing people together, sparking dialogue, deepening understanding, and strengthening the bonds that connect us to one another and to our communities,” says Tamara McCaw, BAM’s president. “The inaugural Playback: The Brooklyn Watch Party embodies that belief, celebrating the creatives and communities that make Brooklyn such a dynamic cultural force.”

Friday, November 6, the first night of the festival, will feature music, poetry, film, and talks at BAM’s Howard Gilman Opera House celebrating Playback’s inaugural guest curators. The following day will include a slate of movies programmed by the curators and a free afternoon block party at BAM with live music and local food. Later, the Opera House will host a screening of 1994’s Crooklyn, with Spike Lee, Alfre Woodard, and more special guests.

Ma, who produced 2018’s Won’t You Be My Neighbor? and Unfinished Business, a 2022 documentary about the New York Liberty, has long seen Brooklyn as a cultural and creative hub. The festival, he says, will carry that tradition forward and invite the community to take part in it.

“When we watch together, we remember what movies can do: bring us closer, challenge us, inspire us, and remind us of our shared humanity.”

For more information, and to sign up for updates and announcements, visit www.playbackbk.com.