Filmmaker Statement

"An Asian boy and a Latina girl vs. three Black guys in a game of basketball. Who do you assume is going to win - and why?" Growing up outside Atlanta, basketball was everything to me. I wore Nike shorts every day, even in winter, and my friends soon dubbed me "The Basketball Kid." But no matter how much I loved the game, I was never on equal footing. On every court I played, I could feel people sizing up my Asian face: assuming I was good at math but bad at sports. In pickup basketball, stereotyping is the default. You judge someone before even the first possession. "The Asian kid can't ball"; "The girl is too weak"; "The Black kid is a natural." Three teenagers set out to hustle people by leaning into existing stereotypes. They discover it's easy enough to play into those roles, but much harder to accept that people might see them in only that way. And it's even harder to realize they may be guilty of doing the same thing...to each other.