Kayla Hardy's "The Quarter Queen"

Kayla Hardy is a mythology expert and multi-hyphenate author and screenwriter of Louisiana Creole descent. She earned her PhD in creative writing and African American literature from SUNY Binghamton University. Hardy is an adjunct professor at SUNY Binghamton University and is an accomplished scholar of Black folklore, mythology, and Voodoo.

Here she dreamcasts an adaptation of The Quarter Queen, her first novel:

The Quarter Queen is the story of New Orleans’ infamous Voodoo Queen, Marie Laveau and her daughter, Marie Laveau II set within a morally gray fantasy that tackles magical factional politics within a racialized 19th century context. At its heart, it is a tumultuous mother-daughter story where Marie’s rebellious daughter must retrace her mother’s past to find answers to very real circling threats in the present. Secretive and filled with awe-inspiring magic, Marie is a figure few can truly know, even her own daughter.

For me, because The Quarter Queen began as a television pilot in its original form, there was always only one actress I pictured capable of tackling Marie’s complex dual nature—and that is Thandiwe Newton. With a take-no-prisoners ferocity and an almost ethereal sensitivity, she remains the immediate choice for Marie’s fiery power and spiritual sageness. Naturally the next question became, but who would play Marie “Ree” Laveau II? And I have to admit that my agent had a pretty great idea that Thandiwe’s actual daughter, Nico Parker, should play Ree. It would be iconic to see an actual mother-daughter duo take on the Maries, an endeavor I can only imagine would lend itself to an authentic dynamic it would be hard to recreate otherwise.

Visit Kayla Hardy's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Quarter Queen.

Q&A with Kayla Hardy.

--Marshal Zeringue