Toronto, ON (November 11, 2020) – Toronto-based film production company Hamilton-Mehta Productions announced today that FUNNY BOY, based on the evocative, queer, coming-of-age award-winning novel by Shyam Selvadurai, will launch its Canadian run on November 16th at a special screening by Available Light Film Festival in Whitehorse, Yukon with simultaneous screenings in Dawson City, Hay River and Yellowknife. The film will then open theatrically in Vancouver, Calgary and Edmonton on Friday, November 27as part of Cineplex Events, and will have its exclusive world broadcast and streaming premiere on Friday, December 4 at 8 p.m. (8:30 NT) on CBC TV and the free CBC Gem streaming service.
Helmed by prolific award-winning filmmaker Deepa Mehta, FUNNY BOY has been chosen as Canada’s submission to the Academy Awards for Best International Feature Film following the trajectory of WATER (2007), Mehta’s groundbreaking film which went on to receive an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language film.
Shot on location and set in Sri Lanka in the 1970s and 80s, FUNNY BOY explores the awakening of sexual identity by a young boy named Arjie set against the backdrop of the civil war. As political tensions escalate to a boiling point between the minority Tamils and the majority Sinhalese, the boy comes of age in a society and family that refuses to embrace differences outside of societal norms. The film mirrors the oppression of the Tamil people with the marginalization Arjie suffers because of who he is and who he loves. Funny Boy chronicles a country torn apart by fear and abuse of power, while Arjie’s struggles to find balance and self-love despite the absence of empathy and understanding.
FUNNY BOY is co-written by Mehta and Selvadurai; produced by David Hamilton and Hussain Amarshi; and stars a stellar cast of Sri Lankan, South Asian, and Canadian actors including Brandon Ingram as the main character ‘Arjie’, Nimmi Harasgama, Agam Darshi, Ali Kazmi, Seema Biswas and Arush Nand as ‘young Arjie’, among many others. FUNNY BOY was made possible with the support of CBC Films, Telefilm Canada and Ontario Creates.
The novel Funny Boy by Shyam Selvadurai, published by McClelland & Stewart, was the winner of the WH Smith Books/Books in Canada First Novel Award, and the Lambda Award for Best Gay Men’s Fiction (1997), and was shortlisted for the Giller Prize (1994) and named an American Library Association Notable Book (1996).
