Sony Pictures has unveiled the official trailer for Prima Facie, with Oscar-nominated Wicked actress Cynthia Erivo taking on the role of a formidable young barrister whose faith in the legal system is shattered by sexual assault.
🎬 Watch the Trailer
Erivo stars as Tessa, a successful lawyer whose career and personal life begin to unravel after she is brutally assaulted by someone within her legal-world circle. Her attempt to seek justice forces her to confront the same system that had previously defined both her work and her identity.
The case carries a particularly difficult history for Tessa. As a barrister, she has defended men charged with sexual assault. After becoming an accuser herself, her experience challenges what she believed about the law and its ability to deliver justice.
Erivo said the character’s contradictions — and the moral uncertainty surrounding her — were central to the role’s appeal.
“I read the script, and then fell in love with the script because I loved the grey area that it dealt with,” Erivo said at TIFF.
She added: “That Tessa wasn’t a straightforward human being. That she was complex in many, many different ways, and that she had a hand in the law. That she was having to deal with, and that that law then was dealt upon her.”
For Erivo, portraying Tessa meant navigating both the character’s professional relationship with the justice system and the intensely personal consequences of being subjected to it.
“The navigation of all that for me was a really interesting thing to have to play and to have to deal with, and I saw it as a challenge and thought, well, I think this might be a good challenge to face,” she said.
From an acclaimed stage production to the screen
Prima Facie is directed by Susanna White, whose credits include The Buccaneer and Andor. The feature has now received its world premiere at TIFF.
The film is adapted from Suzie Miller’s one-woman play of the same name. Jodie Comer led the stage production, which earned Olivier Awards for its West End run, including Best Actress for Comer. She later won a Tony Award for her performance when the play moved to Broadway.
The screen version places Erivo at the center of Miller’s story, following Tessa as the principles that once gave her professional certainty collide with her own experience of seeking accountability. Her past work defending men charged with sexual assault becomes an essential part of that conflict, adding another dimension to her changing view of the judicial system.
What Happens Next?
Prima Facie is scheduled for a theatrical release in the UK and Ireland on November 13. A U.S. distribution plan has not yet been announced.
UTA Independent Film Group and CAA Media Finance are jointly representing sales for the film. Following its TIFF world premiere and the arrival of Sony Pictures’ official trailer, the confirmed next step is its November theatrical launch in the UK and Ireland, while its path to American audiences remains unresolved.