Nate Parker Recruits Armie Hammer For Role In His Nat Turner Biopic, The Birth Of A NationPosted by Wilson Morales
November 12, 2014
Nate Parker has recruited The Social Network‘s Armie Hammer to join the cast of feature directorial debut, The Birth Of A Nation, a biopic of African-American slave turned revolutionary Nat Turner, who led a bloody rebellion in 1831 and went down in history as one of the most controversial American figures preceding the Civil War.
Parker, who will also write the script and star as Turner, is developing the film through a fellowship with the Sundance Institute Feature Film Program. A Norfolk, Virginia native, Nate grew up less than 30 miles from the site of Turner’s unprecedented slave rebellion.
Turner, born in 1800, led the famously violent Virginia insurrection that moved from plantation to plantation freeing slaves and left 60 white men, women, and children dead. He was later captured, arrested, and hanged but his legacy grew to mythic proportions.
Hammer will play Samuel Turner, the son of Nat’s first master Benjamin Turner.
Parker’s upcoming film Beyond The Lights opens on November 14. His other credits include Denzel Washington’s The Great Debaters, Gina Prince-Bythewood’s The Secret Life of Bees, and Red Tails.
Hammer last appeared opposite Johnny Depp in 2013’s The Lone Ranger. He will next be seen in Guy Ritchie’s film adaptation on the TV show, The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
