Every year one festival movie shows up out of nowhere and becomes the thing everyone who was there will not stop talking about. In 2026 that was Club Kid. Jordan Firstman wrote it, directed it and stars in it, it premiered in Un Certain Regard at Cannes in May, and A24 picked it up and has dated it for November 6. The official trailer is out, and it looks like the most alive New York movie in a while.
What it is
A24's synopsis is one line and it is all you need: a hard-partying New York City club promoter sees his whirlwind lifestyle upended by the arrival of the 10-year-old son he never knew he had. Firstman plays the promoter. The kid arrives. The nights stop working the way they used to.
On paper that is a comedy premise you have seen before. What makes it different is who is telling it. Firstman is the comedian who blew up during lockdown with his absurd, rapid-fire impression videos, then turned up playing a version of himself in Rotting in the Sun. People who know him from the internet expect a bit. The trailer makes it clear this is not a bit. It is a scene film about queer nightlife made by someone who has clearly spent real time inside it, and a story about growing up that happens to a grown man.
Who is in it
The cast around Firstman is a smart mix of faces: Cara Delevingne, Diego Calva, Kirby Howell-Baptiste, Reggie Absolom and Colleen Camp, the character actor whose career runs back through decades of cult movies. Calva, who broke out in Babylon, is the one we are most curious to see in this world. The festival lists the film at 126 minutes, which tells you Firstman is not making a sketch stretched to feature length.
It was also made the hard way. The Cannes festival notes that it was shot on 35mm on a very tight budget, with backing from the producers behind Anora and Red Rocket. That lineage matters. Those films found tenderness in people the movies usually laugh at, and the trailer suggests Club Kid is reaching for the same thing.
Why it matters
A24 built its name on exactly this kind of swing: a first-time director with a specific world, a film that refuses to sand its edges down for a wider audience, and a release date that gives it room to find people. We have spent a lot of time on the studio's darker side in our A24 horror starter guide, but the warm, messy, very funny A24 movie is just as much a part of its DNA, and Club Kid looks like the purest example of that lane this year. It is also a useful reminder, after the money questions we raised in our piece on Google's investment in A24, of what the studio is for when it is at its best.
How to watch
A24 has Club Kid dated for November 6, 2026. The studio has not posted theater listings yet, so keep an eye on the film's page and A24's upcoming slate for showtimes as the date gets closer. It sits on our Incoming radar for November, right between the horror, and it might be the best night out on the list.
