With the coronavirus epidemic’s shutdown of movie theaters around the U.S., the upcoming comedic film The Love Birds, starring Issa Rae and Kumail Nanjiani, will drop on Netflix instead, shares The Hollywood Reporter.
The Media Rights Capital and Paramount Pictures film was originally scheduled for an April 3rd premiere but later announced the decision to move the release. It’s unclear whether the film will be streamable on its initial release date. However, the move of skipping the big screen and heading straight to a streaming platform is a first for Paramount Pictures and among movie studios since the global pandemic.
Other media conglomerates like NBCUniversal have made a similar change in direction for their films; Trolls World War will be removed from theaters, made available digitally, and screened at any open movie theaters on Friday, April 10. Universal’s newly released films The Invisible Man, Emma, and The Hunt will also be available for 48-hour spans after they’ve made it to digital platforms. Paramount decided to delay the release of two other anticipated movies, A Quiet Place II and Blue Story. No word on how or whether these films will remain or made available internationally.
On a brighter note, Issa Rae’s HBO television series Insecure will be making its return on April 12, after Rae and her team decided to take a bit of a hiatus. “We needed a break, after going back-to-back for three years,” said the show’s creator to The Guardian in April 2019. “Making that show means nine months out of the year, you can’t do anything else, and nobody wants to feel like a hamster on a wheel. That’s not conducive to creativity at all.”
As we patiently wait for the film to debut (and look for more activities to kill this time of social isolation and self-quarantine), watch The Love Birds’ movie trailer where the almost separated couple Leilani (Rae) and Jibran (Nanjiani) get involved with a bizarre murder mystery case while trying to clear their names.