A Snowy Day in Oakland explores meaningful themes including navigating relationships and family, Entrepreneurship, as well as the importance of exploring mental health issues within the black community

A beautiful psychologist from San Francisco decides to end a stalled romance with her high-profile psychiatrist boyfriend and business partner. She moves on with her life by opening her own practice in a vacant office space in the middle of a small commercial block located across the bay in Oakland, turning the predominantly African American and psychologically ignored neighborhood on its emotional ear.

With legendary stars including Loretta Devine, Nicole Ari Parker, Keith David, Kimberly Elise, Deon Cole and more, A SNOWY DAY IN OAKLAND is displaying the importance of destigmatizing mental health within the Black community.

Nicole Ari Parker stars as LaTrice, a therapist who decides to end a stalled romance with her longtime, high-profile, psychiatrist, boyfriend/business partner. She moves into a predominately African-American and psychologically ignored neighborhood and navigates her practice, her relationships and her sanity with the town’s biggest personalities Davis (Deon Cole) Jeanette (Loretta Devine), and Theona (Kimberly Elise). Her private practice is located in a vacant, street-front office space in the middle of a small, commercial block located across the bay in Oakland.

Cox: Nicole Air Parker, I’m excited to speak about A Snowy Day in Oakland with you. I’ve seen the film, and it’s perfect. I want to ask you what it was about the movie that made you say yes; I will take it.

Parker: I must say it’s because of Director Kim Bass. He is so passionate about telling stories. That’s exactly what I received when I read the script, something heartfelt. He even took things further with the colors of the film. He put this warmth and saturation into it for the audience to have a more visual experience. It was just something so fresh and original with everything he was doing with this project, and I knew I wanted to jump in on it.

Cox: This movie has a message. What will the takeaway be for some?

Parker: That it’s okay to reach out for help. And that sometimes goodness does happen in the end, so you have to keep the faith.

Cox: Your character Latrice is a therapist. With this tone and message in the movie breaking the stigmas of it, what is something you feel is essential for people in our community to take away from the topic of Black mental health and therapy?

Parker: They will see we don’t have to consider it an expense. I want them to see that therapy or counseling is something that participates in and see the value it can add to their lives.

Cox: What are some things you love about your character Latrice?

Parker: I love that she holds her own. She is a composite of everything that happened in her life. I love how Kim briefly takes us back to see where Latrice came from. She isn’t one-dimensional. Her character is relatable to the other characters in the movie because she has many issues like them. But she is there to help them while dealing with her stuff. I like that about her.

Cox: A Snowy Day in Oakland is a movie with a message, especially for the Black community; how important is it to you that we have more movies like this for the community?

Parker: One message that stood out was regarding Black entrepreneurship and ownership. These are important for us to continue because we forget that we owned homes and businesses in the 40s and 50s before everything took them away from us. So, we are resurrecting ownership in our community with conversations and projects like this that place a lens on it. It’s a big topic, and post-pandemic people are now creating their products and services. So, this movie is right on time.