Years ago, if you asked actor Vivian Oparah whether she was a rom-com fan, she would’ve said, “I guess not.” That is, until director Raine Allen-Miller’s Rye Lane came along.
She started reading the script on a long train ride home, struggling to muffle her laughter in public. The writing was hilarious, transporting Oparah back to London and making her fall in love with the character of Yasmin, a “peng and refreshingly disarming” twenty-something who is an aspiring costume designer.
“We all know what we needed when we were younger in terms of representation,” Oparah told HuffPost. “And we didn’t get it. I used to read books because books didn’t have any images, so I could create the worlds myself.”
Rye Lane follows two newly single Black British young adults as they embark on a journey through South London, unpacking heartbreak with hilarity and honesty. The rom-com is replete with community staples, such as Morley’s Chicken and Supermalt, visually stunning scenes from across the neighbourhood and a nod to Croydon native Stormzy on the soundtrack. Rye Lane appreciates the beauty and Blackness of South London while challenging the notion of whose love stories make it to the big screen.
“I remember I was at the Pan African Film Festival in L.A., a guy came up to me afterward and he was like, ‘It’s so gorgeous to see two dark-skinned people on the screen, just the two of you existing,’” Oparah said. “For [Rye Lane] to be a filmic reference that people can go to and see themselves and feel seen feels like such a blessing and also such an honour.”
Oparah describes her character as a “hurricane of a woman who is just unapologetically messy but also brash and has this endless curiosity for the world around her.”
“But [she] cannot extend any of that to herself. I wanted to know why,” Oparah, said, describing Yas’ purported confidence and “I don’t give a fuck” attitude. “I wanted to understand the emotional core of her.”
Soon, hurricane Yas makes landfall, clashing with down-in-the-dumps Dom (David Jonsson). Dom is a young accountant who was just dumped after a six-year relationship. Yas overhears him sobbing in the stalls of a unisex bathroom at an art exhibition. Jonsson — a fan of rom-coms “Love & Basketball, Notting Hill and That Awkward Moment — was drawn to the fact that he had never acted in a rom-com before.
“I think he’s an Everyman in many ways,” Jonsson said of his character in Rye Lane. “He works a very regular job, he loves his girlfriend, he loves football, he loves all the things that feel safe. I think we all look for some sort of comfort. But obviously it sets up a perfect storm of chaos, which I think he finds in Yasmin.”
The very sensitive and secure Dom, who has a penchant for grand gestures, gets his world flipped upside down when he encounters Yas, who has a keen interest in people’s personal messes. Their meet-cute turns into a casual stroll through Peckham and Brixton, which evolves into an all-day affair.
Rye Lane is Oparah’s and Jonsson’s first feature film.
Oparah said that Yas “feels quite far away” from herself, but Yas’ traits are familiar, reminiscent of her best friends. A true Capricorn, Oparah is extremely career-driven, while she sees Yas as a delusional, whimsical Libra. She took a “sandbox approach” to creating Yas, thinking about what music she would listen to, how her arms move and how curious she is. Being able to depict the unapologetic messiness of Yas felt liberating to her.
“As Black women, we keep our shit airtight, always. I think Yas wants to learn in real time, all the time. She has a thought and there’s no sort of processing; it just happens,” said Oparah. “That immediacy of action and feeling that free as a dark-skinned Black woman felt anarchistic, which I loved. Showing her complexities in terms of the way her emotions manifested — from confident to completely insecure to angry to sweet in the space of one paragraph — was definitely a great challenge as an actor.”
She added, “This is someone who clearly has so many defenses and tactics of navigating the world. I feel like a lot of women, a lot of Black women can relate to that. It felt like Yas was just a roulette for all of our experiences, but she was just able to show so many of them. It felt really important. It felt really truthful.”
Contrasting Yas’ inquisitiveness and vacillating emotions, especially as her ever-so-slightly fabricated breakup story unravels, is the steadiness and vulnerability of Dom. Jonsson’s depiction of the character offers a new look on Black masculinity on screen, and the actor said that his hope is to “turn that dial” with the roles he takes.
“It is definitely something that I know means a lot to me and hopefully is a little bit evident in the choices that I’ve made so far when it comes to roles, how we portray the culture and how Black men see ourselves on the screen. I’m just very keen on breaking some of the stereotypes that we have,” Jonsson said.
“He’s multifaceted, man. I think that’s what we are as Black beings. We have so much in us. What I really do love about Dom is that he’s incredibly emotional, straight-up emotional, and it doesn’t take away from the man that he is,’ said Jonsson, citing the fact that he rides shotgun on Yas’ moped and audiences met him crying over Instagram posts in the opening scene.
While Dom hails from South London, Jonsson is an East Londoner. But he recalls how his mother used to go to Peckham to buy meat because it was “10 pence cheaper than the oxtail in East London.” He said that as he watches Rye Lane, it feels much bigger than just a rom-com set in Peckham.
“What I do know is that this film, from the jump, from Sundance has done way more than I or anyone could have expected,” Jonsson said. “It feels like it’s a London we can all celebrate, all know and all uplift. It’s my first film. I’m proud of it, not just because it’s my first movie, but it just means more as a rom-com set around two young, Black dark-skinned leads.”
His hope is that audiences not only revel in a sense of escapism and enjoyment watching Rye Lane, but that people will also unconsciously shift their perspectives on various topics, from dark-skinned leads, to being Black and falling in love and to their view of South London. Oparah said that South London has been depicted frequently in media, albeit negatively, but never through this lens.
“Raine Allen-Miller, the incredible director, she has such a wonderful curiosity for the world around her, especially South London. That’s where she grew up,” Oparah said. “To see her distill her curiosity and love for that place into the film was super special. South is a melting pot of loads of different types of people, generations clashing, cultures clashing, but if you squint and tilt your head a little bit, it makes for something quite beautiful.
Oparah said that what Rye Lane communicates is how truth is the remedy. By showing South London in its entirety, she said, Allen-Miller’s vision has fostered a loving depiction. Moreover, through Dom and Yas’ budding connection, audiences can find beauty in everyone’s messes.
“It’s not your classic rom-com. I don’t think the message is that you can fall in love with a stranger that you meet in a toilet,” Oparah laughed. “But truth feels like the message. You see that on a microcosmic scale in the film. The fact that [Dom and Yas are] honest with each other and vulnerable with each other is what makes everything work in the end. You don’t need to round off the edges and make something sweeter. Things just as they are, a lot of the time, are the most interesting, are fine and can be loved.”
Rye Lane is currently in select UK cinemas and will be released in the UK and Ireland on Disney+ on 3 May 2023.