{"id":698132,"date":"2026-05-27T15:47:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T15:47:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/698132\/"},"modified":"2026-05-27T15:47:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-27T15:47:15","slug":"our-faves-are-making-courtside-the-gay-basketball-rom-com-of-our-wildest-dreams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/698132\/","title":{"rendered":"Our Faves Are Making \u2018Courtside,\u2019 the Gay Basketball Rom-Com of Our Wildest Dreams"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you\u2019re a gay basketball fan, congrats on the return of the WNBA season! And congrats on the announcement of the upcoming feature film\u00a0Courtside! In case you were too busy figuring out where to stream the WNBA game you were trying to watch (seriously, why is this so complicated?!) and missed the news: Jennifer Beals\u2019 and Ilene Chaiken\u2019s production company Run-A-Muck is making a gay basketball rom-com called\u00a0Courtside\u00a0starring actual WNBA players. Most importantly, the film\u2019s writer\/director team are a duo we have a lot of love for here at Autostraddle. The Courtside script comes from Brittani Nichols<\/a>, and it\u2019s directed by Carly Usdin<\/a>! Two longtime members of the Autostraddle family are making a movie that feels collectively dreamed up by Autostraddle readers who love sports!<\/p>\n

The film is about \u201can injury-plagued women\u2019s basketball superstar with championship ambitions who is thrown for a loop when she falls for a teammate,\u201d according to the\u00a0LA Times<\/a>. And it stars real-life WNBA players Gabby Williams,\u00a0 Theresa Plaisance, and Sydney Colson. Colson is also executive producing and said on Instagram<\/a>:\u00a0\u201cIf you like Love & Basketball and Bend It Like Beckham and Bring It On but you found yourself wondering, \u2018could this maybe be a little bit gayer?\u2019 We got great news for you. Because we had the same question, and the answer is \u2018yeah, you can always make it gayer.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Thank you for saying what we\u2019re always thinking.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve known Brittani and Carly for about a decade now, and I cannot imagine two people more perfect for this project. The news of a movie like this being made would feel like a celebration here at Autostraddle no matter what, but the fact that it\u2019s being made by two people who are an indelible part of this place and whose art and work we\u2019ve been hyping up for many years?! This is truly the best development and a rare piece of genuinely exciting news coming out of Hollywood these days.<\/p>\n

Ten years ago, I attended a screening of the gay film Suicide Kale<\/a>, written by and starring Brittani and directed by Carly, and remember thinking they were a brilliant creative team. I have no doubt\u00a0Courtside\u00a0will continue and build upon that brilliance I was lucky enough to witness in the early days of their careers. Since then, Brittani became an award-winning and Emmy-nominated writer and producer on the super hit show\u00a0Abbott Elementary\u00a0and made her directorial debut with season four\u2019s \u201cMusic Class.\u201d Carly directed Mon\u00e9t X Change\u2019s show Mon\u00e9t\u2019s Slumber Party\u00a0and every episode of The Syd + TP Show, so queer basketball fans should already be fans of their work. They\u2019ll be creatively reuniting with Syd and TP for\u00a0Courtside.<\/p>\n

I texted my congratulations to Brittani and Carly on the day of\u00a0Courtside\u2018s announcement and asked if they had a few words to share with Autostraddle readers. \u201cThere have been a few moments in my career that seem really cuckoo but having a project with Ilene Chaiken and Jennifer Beals has got to be the most absurd thing that\u2019s ever happened to me,\u201d Brittani said. \u201cThe excitement around the project has already been incredible but I\u2019m not surprised. Having worked for Autostraddle, I\u2019m intimately familiar with how excited our community is whenever there\u2019s something for us because it so rarely happens. We know people want this story and we\u2019re excited to tell it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBrittani and I have been trying to get this movie off the ground for over five years now, so it\u2019s a real testament to both our combined stubbornness and the obviously gigantic fanbase for women\u2019s sports that we\u2019ve finally gotten here,\u201d Carly added. \u201cHaving actual players like Syd, TP and Gabby involved is incredibly meaningful to me because we care so much about authenticity in the world we\u2019re setting out to portray. But it\u2019s fully surreal that, of all the producers in the world, the ones who share our vision and are fully bought in on us also made The L Word??? Younger Carly would be levitating. Current Carly is also levitating.\u201d<\/p>\n

I for one am grateful for their combined stubbornness in fighting for this film to get made. Women\u2019s sports fans deserve it, lesbians deserve it, and OG Brittani\/Carly\u00a0Suicide Kale\u00a0fans deserve it, too! We\u2019re getting a super gay basketball rom-com from a super gay creative team! DREAMS DO COME TRUE!<\/p>\n

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