A memoir by Beyoncé Knowles’ father Mathew Knowles is to become a feature film, detailing his early years as a student activist.
According to a report in Variety, Knowles’ 2017 book Racism from the Eyes of a Child is in active development as a film, with plans for a TV series as well. The book covers Knowles’ childhood in pre-civil rights Alabama, during which he has said he attended “all-white” high schools and universities: “I had been beaten, I’ve been electrically prodded, I’ve been spit on, I’ve been humiliated, all sorts of trauma.” Knowles graduated from Fisk University in Nashville, an HBCU (historically black college or university).
The film will cover the first part of the book, in which the giants of the fight for civil rights – including Martin Luther King Jr, Albert Turner, Ralph Abernathy and Coretta Scott King – inspired Knowles, who told Variety: “These are the men who made me proud.”
The project appears to be different from The Mathew Knowles Story, plans for which emerged in 2022 after Knowles sold his Music World Entertainment Group to investment fund APX Capital. The Mathew Knowles Story is posited as a “King Richard-style origin story” about Knowles’ stewardship of his daughters Beyoncé and Solange’s music careers, including Beyoncé’s rise to fame in Destiny’s Child. Knowles managed Beyoncé until 2011, when they split in what was described as “a mutual decision”.
