NEON Buys ‘Ailey’ Following Sundance Premiere

NEON strikes again.

The indie label has picked up its second film out of this year’s Sundance, nabbing rights to Jamila Wignot’s “Ailey,” a documentary about dancing icon Alvin Ailey. The film debuted on Saturday and offers rare archival footage of performances by the Ailey Company, along with never-before-heard audio interviews recorded in the last year’s of Ailey’s life. Sundance previously bought “Flee,” an animated movie about a man making sense of his past and his extraordinary journey as a child refugee from Afghanistan.

NEON has seen its profile rise following the triumph of “Parasite,” the South Korean thriller which swept last year’s Academy Awards.

The deal was negotiated by Ayo Kepher-Maat and Jeff Deutchman for NEON and Jason Ishikawa and Shane Riley of Cinetic on behalf of the filmmakers. Dogwoof is handling international sales.

Wignot’s directing work includes the series T”he African-Americans: Many Rivers to Cross,” which won the Peabody Award, the Emmy Award, and the NAACP Image Award, as well as “Town Hall,” a documentary portrait of Tea Party activists.

More to come…