50 Fun Facts About Moonlight Movie

In Moonlight, what does Juan teach Little to do in the ocean off Miami?

Swim. Holding the boy afloat in the Atlantic, Juan tells him he is in the middle of the world, and the crew took the camera into the waves so viewers ride the lesson with them.

Moonlight is based on a never-staged play with which title?

In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue. Tarell Alvin McCraney wrote it in 2003 and it sat unproduced for about a decade, until a Miami arts collective passed the script to Barry Jenkins.

Who plays Little, the youngest version of Chiron, in Moonlight?

Alex Hibbert. He had never made a film: the director found him during an open casting call that toured schools and community centres around Miami.

In which Miami neighbourhood does Chiron grow up in Moonlight?

Liberty City. The director and the playwright were both raised there, a few blocks apart and at the same schools, yet the two never met until they were adults.

Who plays Juan, the drug dealer who becomes a father figure to Chiron in Moonlight?

Mahershala Ali. Juan appears only in the first of the film's three chapters, yet that short stretch of screen time won Ali the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

In Moonlight, what is the heritage of Juan, the dealer who takes Little under his wing?

Afro-Cuban. On the beach Juan tells Little he came from Cuba, and that Black people live in every corner of the world because they were 'the first ones on this planet'.

Who plays Paula, Chiron's mother, in Moonlight?

Naomie Harris. She had always said she would never play a crack addict, and gave in only when the director told her the character was his own mother's story.

Who plays Teresa, Juan's girlfriend, in Moonlight?

Janelle Monáe. The singer had never acted on camera in a film, and her second, Hidden Figures, opened two months later, so both of her first two were up for Best Picture on the same night.

At Juan's dinner table in Moonlight, what does Little ask him to explain?

A homophobic slur. Juan says it is a word used to make gay people feel bad, then has to admit to the boy that he sells drugs and that his mother uses them.

In Moonlight, what has happened to Juan by the time Chiron is a teenager?

He has died. It happens off screen and comes up only in passing, when Chiron's mother remarks that she has not seen Teresa since the funeral.

What nickname does Kevin give the teenage Chiron in Moonlight?

Black. When Chiron asks on the beach why Kevin keeps calling him that, Kevin just says it is his nickname for him, and Chiron grows up to use it as his own street name.

In Moonlight, what does the bully Terrel manipulate Kevin into doing?

Punching Chiron in a hazing ritual. Kevin tells him to stay down so it will end, but Chiron keeps getting back to his feet and meeting his eye.

How does Chiron take revenge on Terrel in Moonlight?

Smashes a chair over his head in class. A day earlier Chiron had refused to tell the principal who beat him; now he is the one led out of school in handcuffs as Kevin looks on.

In Moonlight's third chapter, where is the adult Chiron living and dealing drugs?

Atlanta. He tells Kevin he started over there and 'built myself hard', and his mother has moved to Georgia as well, into a drug rehab centre where he visits her.

In Moonlight, what does Kevin do for a living as an adult?

Cook at a diner. Kevin says he was put on the kitchen line while serving time and took to it, and when Chiron walks in he makes him the chef's special.

Which song does Kevin play for Chiron on the jukebox in Moonlight?

Hello Stranger by Barbara Lewis. Kevin explains that a customer put it on one night and it brought Chiron to mind, which is why he picked up the phone after a decade.

What does Chiron confess to Kevin at the end of Moonlight?

That nobody else has touched him. He tells Kevin he is the only man who ever has, and the film closes on his memory of himself as Little, standing on a beach in the moonlight.

Who plays the adult Chiron in Moonlight's third chapter?

Trevante Rhodes. A former college sprinter, he came in to read for Kevin, and partway through the audition the director stopped him and asked him to try Chiron instead.

Who plays the adult Kevin in Moonlight?

André Holland. A friend of the playwright who had acted in several of his stage plays, he shot his whole part, the final scene included, in just five days.

Who plays the teenage Kevin in Moonlight?

Jharrel Jerome. It was the first job he ever booked, landed during his first year at college, and the beach scene went on to win Best Kiss at the MTV Movie & TV Awards.

Why did Barry Jenkins keep Moonlight's three Chiron actors apart during filming?

To avoid them imitating one another. Each shot his chapter in a separate two-week block, and the three did not meet until the finished film was playing at festivals.

Whose faces are merged into a single portrait on Moonlight's theatrical poster?

The three actors who play Chiron. Each third of the face belongs to a different actor and is tinted its own colour, echoing the way the film splits one life into three chapters.

By Barry Jenkins's own account, roughly what did Moonlight cost to make?

$1.5 million. That is the director's own figure, though some listings put it nearer $4 million; either way the film went on to take about $65 million at cinemas worldwide.

Which company financed and released Moonlight, the first film it produced itself?

A24. Until then the company had only distributed other people's films, such as Spring Breakers and Ex Machina; this time it put up the whole budget and kept the worldwide rights.

The actor cast as Juan in Moonlight was then best known for which television role?

Remy Danton in House of Cards. He was still playing the lobbyist while Moonlight was being shot, and Luke Cage, his other series of the time, had not yet reached screens.

Which capital, recommended to Barry Jenkins as Europe's most boring city in summer, is where he wrote Moonlight?

Brussels. He had asked friends for a place with no distractions, and once the draft was done he moved on to Berlin on the same trip and adapted a James Baldwin novel he had no rights to.

In the play behind Moonlight, how were the three stages of Chiron's life presented?

All at once, side by side. The script followed a single day for the boy, the teenager and the man together, and only partway through did it become clear that they were one person.

Each of Moonlight's three chapters was colour-graded to imitate what?

Different film stocks. Shot on a digital camera, the chapters were graded to mimic Fuji, then Agfa, then Kodak film, and the long-retired Agfa look is what tints the middle chapter greenish-blue.

Which hip-hop remix technique did composer Nicholas Britell apply to Moonlight's orchestral score?

Chopped and screwed. He recorded the strings and piano first, then slowed and bent the recordings, so that in the schoolyard fight Chiron's theme rumbles about three octaves below where it began.

Which festival, where Barry Jenkins had worked for years, gave Moonlight its world premiere in 2016?

Telluride. Jenkins was a longtime member of the Colorado festival's staff, and three years before the premiere he met the film's future producers there after hosting a Q&A.

Moonlight's Joi McMillon became the first Black woman nominated for an Oscar in which craft?

Film editing. She cut the third chapter, including the two men's reunion, while Nat Sanders took the first two; both had been at film school with the director.

Which Oscar did Moonlight win besides Picture and Supporting Actor?

Screenplay. It won as an adapted script, though a week earlier the same script had taken the Writers Guild prize for original screenplay: the play behind it had never been staged or published.

Which film was mistakenly announced as Best Picture before Moonlight?

La La Land. Its producers were partway through their thank-you speeches when one of them, Jordan Horowitz, announced that Moonlight had won and held up the card to prove it.

Which presenters were handed the wrong envelope for Best Picture at the 2017 Oscars?

Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway. They were on stage to mark 50 years of Bonnie and Clyde; he hesitated over the card and showed it to her, and she read out the wrong film.

At the 2017 Oscars, the Best Picture presenters had been handed the envelope for which other award?

Best Actress. The accountants keep a duplicate of every envelope on each side of the stage, and the presenters were given the spare for the award that had just been handed out.

Which accounting firm handed over the wrong envelope at the 2017 Oscars?

PricewaterhouseCoopers. The partner who passed it over had been on his phone and tweeted a backstage photo of a winner moments later; neither he nor his colleague worked the Oscars again.

Who hosted the 2017 Oscars, the night of Moonlight's Best Picture mix-up?

Jimmy Kimmel. Hosting for the first time, he walked out during the confusion and joked that he blamed Steve Harvey, who had once crowned the wrong Miss Universe.

Moonlight's director, producer, cinematographer and both editors all studied film at which university?

Florida State University. The cinematographer had been the director's roommate there, and it was their classmate, the producer, who told him it was time to make a second film.

The actor who won an Oscar as Moonlight's Juan won the same award two years later for which film?

Green Book. He played the concert pianist Don Shirley without playing the music himself: the film's composer taught him the basics and doubled for his hands in the close-ups.

In Moonlight, what does Little boil a large pot of water on the stove for?

A hot bath. He tips the pot into the tub and squeezes in dish soap for bubbles, a routine the director took from his own childhood, when he heated his bathwater the same way.

Who plays Chiron as a teenager in Moonlight's middle chapter?

Ashton Sanders. The script reached him at the Chicago drama school where the playwright had trained years before, and where a scene class had already made him a fan of the man's plays.

Which Golden Globe did Moonlight win from its six nominations?

Best Motion Picture – Drama. It was the film's only win of the night: it lost for directing, writing, music and both acting nominations, including the supporting actor who took the Oscar weeks later.

The actor who won an Oscar as Moonlight's Juan was hailed as the first actor of which faith to win one?

Muslim. Headlines called him the first Muslim actor to win an Oscar, though the Academy keeps no record of religion and an Oscar winner of the 1970s, Ellen Burstyn, has long followed Sufism.

Which 2008 romance was Barry Jenkins's only feature film before Moonlight?

Medicine for Melancholy. It follows a young couple around San Francisco the day after a one-night stand, and none of the feature scripts he developed next was filmed until Moonlight, eight years on.

Tarell Alvin McCraney wrote the script that became Moonlight in 2003, just after what happened?

His mother's death from AIDS. She had struggled with crack addiction, as the director's own mother had, and the film's Paula was drawn from both women.

Moonlight producers Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner came aboard from which production company?

Plan B Entertainment. Brad Pitt's company had produced 12 Years a Slave, and after Jenkins hosted a festival Q&A for that film in 2013 its two partners asked what he was writing.

Early in Moonlight, where does Little hide from the boys chasing him?

In a boarded-up drug den. Juan pulls the plywood off a window to climb in, and instead of scolding the silent boy he offers to take him for something to eat.

When it won, Moonlight had the smallest US box office of any Best Picture winner since which film?

The Hurt Locker. It had taken under $15 million when it won, against about $22 million for Moonlight, whose biggest weekend came only after the Oscars, on more than 1,500 screens.

In Moonlight's second chapter, what does Paula force the teenage Chiron to hand over?

The money Teresa gave him. Paula tells him Teresa is no kin of his and that she is his blood, then takes his last few dollars to feed her addiction.

Moonlight's cinematography was built around bringing out rich colour in what?

Skin tones. The film-makers wanted to escape the documentary look expected of films about social issues, so they pushed the contrast and gave the cast's skin a shine, to make viewers feel the Miami sun.