''We Are Kings'' is an independent feature film directed by Toby Hubner and starring Sammy Blue,

Bianca Ryan Bianca Taylor Ryan (born September 1, 1994) is an American musician, singer and songwriter from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Ryan was the first winner of NBC's ''America's Got Talent'' at the age of eleven. Singing two Broadway show tunes along t ...

, Rita Graham, Jonathon "Boogie" Long and Pryce. The film was

crowdsourced Crowdsourcing involves a large group of dispersed participants contributing or producing goods or services—including ideas, votes, micro-tasks, and finances—for payment or as volunteers. Contemporary crowdsourcing often involves digita ...

beginning with a

Kickstarter Kickstarter is an American public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative projects to life". As of July 2021, ...

campaign. It premiered in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, on September 19, 2014.

Plot

Mississippi

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the Afr ...

man I. Be King and his wife Lilly eke out a meager living playing music at their "juke club" The Blues Bucket, but they've fallen behind in their lease payments. When the club is repossessed by the bank, the two move into their Winnebago (also called The Blues Bucket), but the stress proves too much for Lilly and a stroke sends her to the hospital. King then heads to

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

hoping to score the recording deal that he expects will save his wife and their club. In Chicago, the executive who offered the deal decides instead to dismiss King, calling his music "not commercial enough". King gives up, gets drunk, and passes out in a parking lot and nearly freezes to death. Two homeless musicians, Layla and Dustin, are guided by an angel to save King and, after taking on Sam, a runaway rapper, they begin traveling around the Chicago area, playing impromptu gigs in an effort to raise the money needed to help King get back to Mississippi and make everything right. Their journey is complicated when police pull over the motor home to take Layla and Sam into custody. Each had been reported missing and felony charges were involved.

Cast

* Sammy Blue as I. Be King *

as Layla Knuckles * Rita Graham as Lilly King * Jonathon "Boogie" Long as Dustin Ladue * Pryce as Sam the rapper

Production

Co-producer-writer-director Toby Hubner financed his film under the working title ''We Be Kings'' with the help of a Kickstarter campaign that ran for three weeks starting in February 2012. Nearly

US$ The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...

9,000 was pledged, surpassing the goal of $7,500. ''Kings'' was originally to star Chicago blues legend

Magic Slim Morris Holt (August 7, 1937 – February 21, 2013), known as Magic Slim, was an American blues singer and guitarist. Born at Torrance, near Grenada, Mississippi, the son of sharecroppers, he followed blues greats such as Muddy Waters and How ...

, but Slim fell ill and died just as production was getting started. Blue, once dubbed "the Crown Prince of the Blues" by

Muddy Waters McKinley Morganfield (April 4, 1913 April 30, 1983), known professionally as Muddy Waters, was an American blues singer and musician who was an important figure in the post-war blues scene, and is often cited as the "father of modern Chicago b ...

, took over the role and "did a remarkable job with little preparation and under tough circumstances." Ryan, the first winner of ''

America's Got Talent ''America's Got Talent'' (often abbreviated as ''AGT'') is a televised American talent show competition, and is part of the global ''Got Talent'' franchise created by Simon Cowell. The program is produced by Fremantle (as well as distribut ...

'', signed on in 2012. Blues vocalist Grana Louise was originally set to co-star as Lilly and

Quinn Sullivan Quinn Sullivan (born March 26, 1999) is an American singer, songwriter and guitarist from New Bedford, Massachusetts, United States. He is known for his accomplishments at an early age, marked by appearances on media such as ''The Ellen DeGen ...

was to play Dustin; they were replaced by Graham (formerly of

The Raelettes The Raelettes (or occasionally The Raelets or The Raeletts) were an American girl group formed in 1958 to provide backing vocals for Ray Charles. They were reformed from the group The Cookies. Between 1966 and 1973, the Raelettes recorded on T ...

) and Long, respectively. Still, without Slim, the film was "floundering" and investors backed out. Hubner then caught a break in the form of bonus airline miles and an accompanying credit card. A crew of six people ("a photographer, a sound girl, and four students") captured music and film footage at a strip mall, a motel, a bowling alley and several other locations in places like

Normal Normal(s) or The Normal(s) may refer to: Film and television * ''Normal'' (2003 film), starring Jessica Lange and Tom Wilkinson * ''Normal'' (2007 film), starring Carrie-Anne Moss, Kevin Zegers, Callum Keith Rennie, and Andrew Airlie * ''Norma ...

and

El Paso, Illinois El Paso is a city in Woodford and McLean counties in the U.S. state of Illinois. The population was 2,810 at the 2010 census. The Woodford County portion of El Paso is part of the Peoria, Illinois Metropolitan Statistical Area. El Paso is a s ...

. An additional

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campaign via Indiegogo helped complete the film.

Music

The cast members, all working musicians, wrote and performed their own music under the supervision of Blue. The official soundtrack album was released in November 2014.

Critical reception

LA Weekly ''LA Weekly'' is a free weekly alternative newspaper in Los Angeles, California. It was founded in 1978 by Jay Levin, who served as president and editor until 1991. Voice Media Group sold the paper in late 2017 to Semanal Media LLC, whose paren ...

'' columnist Chuck Wilson called ''We Are Kings'' a "rare ... film about musicians where you actually look forward to the next song." Wilson said Ryan, Long and Pryce are "so bursting with talent that it's impossible to pick a favorite", but felt the finale was "rushed" with "too much triumph, too little emotion". Michael Rechtshaffen wrote in the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...

'' that Hubner's "love letter to the blues" is constantly threatened by the "clunky dramatic staging and discordant emoting" from the "non-actor musicians", but praised the "palpable, soulful authenticity to the musical performances which ultimately draw you in" to a film with its heart "unmistakably in the right place." '' Life In LA''s Shannon Pierce noted a couple of plot holes, but called ''Kings'' a "great" film with an ending that "gives you a 'jump for joy' feeling."

Home video

The film's producers plan to include a "special tribute" to Magic Slim for the Blu-ray/DVD release.