Some Love Stories Start with a Glance. This One Starts with a Movement.
A love story doesn’t just have to be between two people, says Jana Naomi Smith, the creator of Red for Revolution.
Seven years ago, the writer and filmmaker Jana Naomi Smith hit a wall with her application for film school. The problem? She had to write a short screenplay on a theme she personally found corny, tired and overdone: “Love at first sight.”
But something had to be written. So, instead of going with the expected, “boy meets girl and they all lived happily ever after” plot line, she decided to focus on how one’s passion for changing the world is love in and of itself.
Activism revolves around action items and to-do lists, but Smith was drawn to the love that fuels resistance—the quiet acts of service, the deep commitment, the care that holds movements together. “More than romance, love is a force,” she explained. “Tender, transformative, and deeply sustaining.”
And so her screenplay was written.
Smith never went to grad school but in the years since, she has adapted that screenplay for a short film, a web series, and a TV pilot—always leaving one scene unchanged: A fictional jazz singer named Lorraine Giovanni, captivated by an activist’s speech at a labor rights rally, later confesses that she’s fallen in love—not with Ella the activist, but with the cause.
Smith grew up in Gary, Indiana, captivated by the boldness of Black women public figures, like Billie Holiday and Dr. Maya Angelou. Their influence shaped her artistic vision, fueling a deep exploration of Black womanhood, erased histories, and intergenerational healing. “I feel like I’m continuing a conversation that did not start with me,” she says of her work’s mission.
In the spring of 2022, as a surge of homophobic rhetoric from Black evangelical influencers flooded Smith's social media and devastating reports of murdered Black trans women filled her Instagram feed, the weight of it made one thing clear: She needed to create something that pushed back on the “negativity in her orbit,” something like her shelved revolutionary love story.
And that’s how “Red for Revolution” (R4R) was born.
Created, written, directed, and co-executive produced by Smith, the six-part audio drama tells intergenerational stories of Black women, queer love, and liberation. The cast includes Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, S. Epatha Merkerson, Loretta Devine, Jennifer Beals, and Danny Glover.
The story follows Lorraine and Ella’s passionate love affair as seen through the eyes of 18-year-old Jazmine, a present-day college freshman who is navigating her own queer identity, first crush, and a complicated relationship with her homophobic mother. We learn that Ella is Jazmine’s grandmother, and as Jazmine seeks wisdom from her, we are transported back to 1971, when Ella was navigating her own identity challenges.
Smith and her team completed the series in 2024. It won the Best Independent Audio Fiction Award at that year’s Tribeca Film Festival, and received a distribution deal on the back of that win. This month, Radiotopia coincided its release with Black History Month and (of course!) the month we celebrate St. Valentine.
Smith talked to The Persistent about how crucial it is to amplify Black women’s narratives and how those narratives rest on the shoulders of women who have come before.
