Jake Shears is helping a once lost piece of LGBTQ history reach a wider audience, with the Scissor Sisters singer boarding Tinderbox as a producer.
The film tells the story of the 1973 Up Stairs Lounge fire, which was the worst mass murder of LGBTQ people in America until the Pulse Nightclub shooting in 2016. Author Robert Fieseler brought attention to the tragedy in his 2018 book, Tinderbox: The Untold Story of the Up Stairs Lounge Fire and the Rise of Gay Liberation.
In addition to producing, Shears will lend music from his albums Jake Shears and B-Sides.
The project has had Hollywood interest for years and is now getting off the ground under filmmakers Colby Holt and Sam Probst, who will write and direct. The duo previously helmed the indie horror movie Ganymede, about a wrestler who develops a crush on his openly gay classmate.
Colby Holt and Sam Probst
Oscar Partridge for Colby & Sam
Holt and Probst happened to be listening to Shears’ albums Jake Shears and B-Sides as they were reading Tinderbox. “The more we listened, the more we started to think that Jake’s songs and lyrics related to different characters and scenes in Robert’s book,” the duo said in a statement. “Jake and Robert are both New Orleanians, and we feel since these two works were created in this same city, during the same time period, they must have just been in the air together and somehow we picked up on the tune.”
Cory Thompson, known for the 2024 thriller Barron’s Cove, is producing through his Rewind Artists.
“Tinderbox is exactly the kind of project we’re passionate about developing at Rewind Artists—stories that are both artistically ambitious and culturally significant,” said Thompson. “Robert’s book is extraordinary, and from the moment Colby and Sam shared their vision for the adaptation, I knew this was a film we wanted to help bring to life. Jake’s involvement only strengthens an already incredible creative team, and we’re excited to continue building the project together.”
Holt and Probst are repped by Rewind Artists. Shears, who recently acted in Pillion, is repped by WME and Fascination Management. Fieseler is repped by UTA.
