Jamaican/Canadian actress Jazmin Headley makes her silver screen début in the biographical sports film, The Fire Inside, which hits US theatres on Christmas Day.
The Fire Inside is the true story of Claressa ‘T-Rex’ Shields, a boxer from Flint, Michigan, who was the first woman in the US to win an Olympic gold medal in boxing. Twelve-year-old Headley plays a young ‘T-Rex’.
The Amazon MGM movie was successfully screened at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 7 and premièred in the US on December 4 at the Directors Guild of America in Los Angeles. “The screening created an immediate buzz here in Toronto, and an Oscar nomination for the movie is already being talked about by industry insiders,” Headley’s mother, Deborah Myers said.
The Fire Inside was directed by cinematographer Rachel Morrison, known for her work on films Black Panther and Fruitvale Station. It was written and produced by Oscar-winning Barry Jenkins (Moonlight and If Beale Street Could Talk).
An excited Headley, who was born in Canada to Jamaican parents, expressed gratitude to persons such as Rachel Morrison, Brian Henry, and Claressa Shields, “the GOAT”. “You have set the bar high for female boxers. It was an honour to play the young Claressa Shields,” Headley added.
She also shouted out her parents “for being my biggest supporters”.
Headley’s acting credits include an appearance in the London Palladium production Joseph & The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat that had its Toronto 2022 season run at the Princess of Wales Theatre. She is also a former cast member of the CBC Kids TV series Ukulele U.
The youngster recently established a ‘Jazmin Headley Corner’ at the KPH/Victoria Jubilee Hospital in Kingston and the Black River Hospital in St Elizabeth. This dream was started two years ago as a summer project by her JAZZME Foundation, to donate a desktop computer and other educational supplies to the May Pen Hospital in Clarendon.