Layla (Bilal Hasna) is a British-Palestinian drag queen who has always felt a bit like an outsider in London, especially around her traditional Muslim family, who don’t know about her secret “hobby” or that she prefers non-binary pronouns out of drag.
Thankfully, she’s got a fantastic chosen family of queer friends around her to give her all the support she needs—which sometimes includes zipping her up in gowns and making sure that mug looks right.
Layla and her pals tend to stick to their queer bubble, but every once in a while an opportunity presents itself to get paid doing drag “behind enemy lines”—in London’s financial district. Hey, a gig’s a gig!
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One day, while selling her soul for a corporate pride event, Layla catches the eye of a handsome young advertising executive named Max (Masters Of The Air‘s Louis Greatorex). He might look a little more buttoned-up and straight-laced, but Max is gay, too, and before they know it, the pair are out dancing the night away.
The feature directorial debut for actor-filmmaker-activist Amrou Al-Kadhi—also known as their fabulous drag persona Glamrou—Layla at first presents itself as a sort of queer spin on Romeo + Juliet: Two star-crossed lovers from different worlds, fighting to be together against the odds.
But it gradually becomes something more surprising and thoughtful, exploring nuances within our broader queer community rarely discussed on screen.
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Max is in awe of Layla—nearly to the point of fetishization—openly jealous that she can, as he sees it, live so fearlessly outside conventional understandings of gender and sexuality. Meanwhile, Layla believes she’s had to set boundaries in order to embrace her authentic self, keeping her distance from a family that might not understand.
Both can’t help but wonder if the grass is greener on the other side. But the more time Max spends in Layla’s world, the more she relaizes she can’t do the same, and their unavoidable differences create an uncomfortable wedge between them.
Layla effortlessly balances those big ideas with a ton of fun, too. It’s colorful, funny, and has a killer soundtrack to boot. This is a movie about a drag queen, after all, and you better believe it delivers on some fierce performance numbers! (Drag Race UK fans should keep an eye out for Season 4 favorite Baby in a supporting role!)
Plus, it features some pretty steamy intimate scenes that’ll have your jaw on the floor. Let’s just saw that after one moment in particular, you’ll never look at a drag queen’s high heels the same way again…
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The film made its world premiere at Sundance earlier this year where it was a real breakout hit. We called star Bilal Hasna’s performance the best film debut of the festival, writing he’s got “the charisma, uniqueness, nerve, and talent to carry the dramedy with grace, able to go big for the film’s showy drag numbers and subtle in the queen’s stop-and-start romance.” Recently, his work was announced on the long-list for the British Independent Film Awards’ breakthrough performance of the year.
When we spoke with Hasna at the festival, he shared what he hopes audiences can take away from the film: “Being queer and being Arab can exist in harmony, despite what the world, what the media might tell us—despite the rhetoric that we hear so often, and so dangerously. These things can exist in harmony, and actually, we have the power in ourselves to draw those harmonies.”
After bows at Newfest in NYC, as well as the BFI Flare and London Film Festival, Layla is heading to U.K. cinemas on November 22. U.S. release plans have yet to be announced, but in the meantime you can check out the films’ first official trailer below:
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