Slanted

Did You Know?

• Principal photography took place from June 24 to July 22, 2024, in Atlanta.
• In May 2024, Fox Entertainment green-lit production through its subsidiary Tideline Entertainment.
• Maitreyi Ramakrishnan and Amelie Zilber were cast for significant supporting roles.

Plot

Chinese-American teenager Joan Huang has always felt out of place among her white classmates and embarrassed by her own looks. Since she was little, she wanted to be prom queen, so when the school’s most popular girl, Olivia Hammond, says she won’t run, Joan sees a chance. She tries to win Olivia over by dyeing her hair blonde and hooking her up with a discount at a Chinese nail salon, but neither works. Then Joan gets messages from the people behind Ethnos, an app that changes your ethnicity in photos, offering her a rare opportunity.

She finds out Ethnos is actually a clinic doing ethnic modification surgery. The founder, Dr. Willie Singer, an Indian-American doctor who felt overlooked compared to white colleagues, created a procedure that makes patients look white—and he’s used it on himself and his staff. Wanting to fit in, Joan tricks her mother Sofia into signing a permission slip by saying it’s for a school trip. After the surgery, Joan looks white and notices people treat her differently right away.

Her parents, Sofia and Roger, are shocked and try to undo it, but Dr. Singer says it’s permanent and she’ll be better off. Joan goes back to school calling herself Jo Hunt and quickly becomes friends with Olivia. She throws a party at a house her dad cleans for a client named Harmony. At the party, Olivia says she’ll endorse Jo for prom queen if Jo proves she’s loyal.

Joan’s Indian-American friend Brindha figures out who she is and tries to comfort her. But Olivia pushes Jo to kick Brindha and her other non-white friends out. Jo does it, earning Olivia’s support but losing Brindha, who wonders if Joan hates her own ethnicity so much that she looks down on everyone else who isn’t white. Meanwhile, Joan feels more and more distant from her parents.