Akeelah and the Bee
Changing the world... one word at a time.
Country
Production
Genre
Budget
$8 000 000
Box office
$18 948 425
Director
Actors
Keke Palmer, Laurence Fishburne, Angela Bassett, Curtis Armstrong, J.R. Villarreal, Sean Michael Afable, Sahara Garey, Lee Thompson Young, Julito McCullum, Erica Hubbard
All actors and roles (10)
All actors and roles (10)
Scenario
Producer
Laurence Fishburne, Nancy Hult Ganis, Danny Llewelyn, Mark Cuban
Camera operator
Composer
Aaron Zigman
Artist
Audition
Jaki Brown, Kim Taylor-Coleman, Aisha Coley
Editing
Glenn Farr, Jennifer Booth
Whole Team (66)
Whole Team (66)
Short description
11-year-old Akeelah Anderson has a way with words. After winning her schoolwide spelling bee, she decides to enter the competition, despite her classmates' derision and the antipathy of her mother Tanya. Thanks to the efforts of her teacher Dr. Larabee, she reaches the finals. As she gets to know her fellow competitors, Akeelah realizes that coming first isn't everything in life.
What's left behind the scenes
- Sidney Poitier was initially considered for the role that eventually went to Laurence Fishburne, but a younger actor was ultimately preferred.
- The character of Laurence Fishburne was based on the school principal that director and screenwriter Doug Etchison attended.
- The last word Dylan received in the word-off—"logorrhea"—is a symptom of a speech pathology characterized by uncontrollable, incoherent speech at a rapid pace.
- Akila and Dylan intentionally lost and threw the match. In reality, such a decision would have cost a fortune. The 2005 contest winner took home the equivalent of $30,000 in cash and prizes, while the runner-up had to settle for much less.
- When Akila (played by Keke Palmer) wins a prize in a regional competition, a zoomed-in image of a local newspaper article appears on screen. The names of the school principal and Akila's main rival mentioned in the article do not match the names of those characters in the movie. This suggests that the prop was created (and used) before the final decision regarding the names was made.
- There is a plaque with a quote on the wall of the principal's office. The film erroneously claims that these words were spoken by Nelson Mandela (1918-2013, South Africa's first Black president) in his inaugural speech. This is a widespread misconception, as Mandela did not actually use this quote in any of his subsequently published speeches. The words were spoken by Marianne Williamson, an American author, speaker, and political activist.
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Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
