It started as a murmur, then quickly grew, becoming a pounding backbeat to the final days of the film festival. Sometimes it seemed there was just one question on the lips of the critics and film distributors scouting for the next breakaway hit along the Croisette in Cannes: “Have you seen Club Kid yet?”
The film, directed by the Hollywood troublemaker, writer and actor Jordan Firstman, captivated audiences at screenings last week, stealing attention from the main festival competition and the established directors angling for the Palme d’Or. First there was a six-minute standing ovation in the Palais des Festival after Club Kid premiered in this year’s Un Certain Regard series. Then came the party, with club ravers bussed in from Marseille. Finally, an unexpectedly huge $17m distribution deal was clinched following a bidding war. Focus Features, Mubi, Searchlight and Netflix were all reported to be circling the title, but the independent American producer and distributor A24 won the day. No wonder Firstman, 34, told the press: “It’s really been the best week of my life.”
The actor, who is an outspoken and controversial fixture in the queer scene in Los Angeles, is also one of the stars of the HBO show I Love LA.
“It’s been a whirlwind, but it is beginning to sink in now, a really special moment,” Ben Hubley, Firstman’s old friend and a co-producer on the film, told The Observer, as he and the director spent a final weekend in Cannes together. “It’s been great to see it strike a chord with audiences, because it is really a universal story. A lot of people relate to it, not just queer people, but anyone who’s had to grow up living in a big city, where there’s so much stimulation that you can get stuck. People really loved it.”
Club Kid has also made an overnight star of a young Brit. Reggie Absolom, 13, seen on television in The Other Bennet Sister, plays the son who is suddenly foisted upon a reluctant New York clubber. The positive public reaction at the first Cannes screening prompted tears from Firstman, who raised Absolom up above the crowd to receive applause. “I was sitting next to Reggie’s mum in the screening and I loved it,” said Hubley. “We were both bawling away.”
The film also stars Diego Calva and the British model and actor Cara Delevingne. The plot follows a hedonistic and jaded party promoter, played by Firstman, who has to suddenly start taking responsibility as a parent – against his instincts. It was partly inspired by the more mainstream comedy Big Daddy, starring Adam Sandler, and by its predecessors Look Who’s Talking and Three Men and a Baby. Firstman has explained that Club Kid is deliberately sentimental, or “corny by design”.
He admits that the film’s tone mirrors his own experience. He has revealed that he helped his gay sister have a child with her wife by donating sperm. The child, he said, will eventually know him as an uncle.
Born in Long Island, New York, Firstman has already directed two short films, and three years ago he starred in Sebastián Silva’s black comedy thriller Rotting in the Sun, playing himself. Last year he put out a comedy album that drew on all the comments made by his Instagram followers and became a viral hit.
His new film has altered perceptions of Firstman in Hollywood, where he had built a reputation for irreverent humour and blunt satire, particularly in the sketches he posts on Instagram and TikTok. His recent criticism of the portrayal of queer culture in the HBO ice hockey show Heated Rivalry sparked a backlash in the gay community, while his sarcastic online presence, built up during the pandemic lockdowns, divided his audience to the point where Firstman has said he felt like “a bit of a punching bag”.
But Hubley said he had no doubts about the director’s broader creativity: “I have known Jordan socially for a long time now, so I knew there were many other sides to him.”
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START OPTIONAL CUT Firstman has talked about finding more compassion for the Manhattan gay community while making Club Kid. The film does not, he claims, condemn all the excesses of the clubbing scene.
Authenticity was crucial to the project, according to Hubley, and he and Firstman worked hard to gain the trust of the real partygoers who feature in the film. “We entered a world that we’d been cultivating for some time – we did not simulate it,” he said. “There are real New York icons in the film. I cast the actual bouncer at Basement, for example, and we filmed at two real parties after gaining permission. So there is a lot of unscripted dialogue.”
Last week’s Cannes after-party rivalled those shown in the film and featured the renowned DJs Bobby Beethoven and lsdxoxo, who were flown in to help the cast celebrate.
END OPTIONAL CUT Showbiz is fickle, but Cannes, it seems, is still a place to make or break a career in cinema – at least for risk-takers. As Rolling Stone magazine has declared: “Rarely has a breath of fresh air like this been so welcome on the Croisette.”