Jayme Lawson is stepping behind the camera for the first time. The actress announced that I Got You, her debut short film as a writer and director, will have its world premiere at the 29th annual SCAD Savannah Film Festival, running October 24 through October 31.
Lawson also stars in the film alongside Motell Foster, Joshua Boone, Elise Taylor, Morgana Van Peebles, Blaire Brooks, Joy Decker, Aubrey J. Carter, and Vanessa Magula. The project comes from Quartermaster Creative, produced by Nicole Palermo, Kelli Reilly, and Jade Lewis, with cinematography by Connie Huang. Announcing the premiere, Lawson wrote that the film represents more than just a creative milestone, calling it one thing to have a dream and another to find people willing to help see it through.
I Got You will screen as part of the festival’s “Hearts Across Time and Space” shorts program, alongside other world premieres including Kelly McCready’s Perfect Love. The placement puts Lawson’s directorial debut inside a festival widely regarded as one of the most significant pre-Oscar stops on the circuit.
Now in its 29th year, SCAD Savannah Film Festival has grown into the largest university-led film festival in the country, drawing more than 74,000 attendees annually and screening work that has gone on to earn over 250 Academy Award nominations throughout its history. This year’s lineup opens October 24 with Bleecker Street and LD Entertainment’s A Talent for Murder, features A24’s The Debut as its Centerpiece Gala presentation on October 27, and closes October 31 with Searchlight’s Wild Horse Nine. Honorees this year include Helen Mirren, Julianne Moore, Paul Bettany, Emmy Rossum, and Ethan Hawke and Sterlin Harjo, among others.
For Lawson, whose acting career has included high-profile roles in The Batman and The Woman King, the festival placement offers a rare kind of visibility for a first short film, premiering in the same week and on the same stage as awards-season heavyweights, in front of an audience built specifically around discovering new filmmaking voices.
Festival tickets are available now at filmfest.scad.edu.