We Love You, Charlie Freeman optioned for film

Sovereign Films has acquired global film rights to We Love You, Charlie Freeman by Kaitlyn Greenidge (Algonquin Books).

We Love You, Charlie Freeman, which was originally published in March 2016, is a "remarkably accomplished" debut novel. The book focuses on the Freemans, an African American family living in Boston, who suddenly uproot themselves for the promise of a new life in a nearly all-white town in rural Massachusetts. They are to take part in a research experiment to teach sign language to a chimpanzee, Charlie, who will live with them.

The film will be produced by Sovereign Films and written by Jonathan Feldman.

Greenidge said: “I'm very excited that the book has found a home with Donald and Andreas at Sovereign Films. It's a complex book about race, language, history and family and I can't wait to see how Jonathan Feldman will bring it to life on the screen.”

Donald Rosenfeld and Andreas Roald of Sovereign Films said: “We are thrilled to be making a film from Kaitlyn's masterful first novel. She has distilled the very heart of our ever evolving, deeply troubling racial division, which continues to haunt us as a people. It is very rare that a book so inhabits the zeitgeist, and we hope that our movie will introduce a broad audience to this most important, this essential story.”