Real Poets & Poetry in Sara Colangelo's The Kindergarten Teacher

At the LA Times, a video from the Sundance Film Festival reveals how director Sara Colangelo acquired the poetry she used in her film, The Kindergarten Teacher. Also seen here are actors Maggie Gyllenhaal and Ajay Naidu, with actor Anna Baryshnikov at the L.A. Times Studio in Sundance, Utah. In a review of the film, Vulture's Emily Yoshida also notes that when the student of Gyllenhall's character "begins to demonstrate his talent for poetry, that dream life starts to light up." From that piece:

At first, she starts passing off his poems as hers in her class, earning the respect of her classmates and the attention of her teacher, but The Kindergarten Teacher is about more than a mere imposter. Tending to tiny Jimmy like a little flower becomes at once a new opportunity to raise a child, and a possible window into a world of intellectual and artistic stimulation. She becomes obsessed with him, pulling him out of class during nap time so that she can mentor him, even having his unsophisticated nanny (Rosa Salazar) fired so she can take over his after-school time. She scrambles for a pad and paper every time he starts to recite, as if taking dictation from a divine medium. Colangelo watches her unwaveringly, fully aware we’ll think she’s insane, but confident that there’s always another layer of her waiting to be revealed.

[...]

For me, the film ends when the mysterious subject of Jimmy’s first awe-inspiring poem is revealed, and Lisa’s reaction says everything about what’s really at stake for her. I shrieked with laughter, then felt a pit open up in my stomach. And the pit stayed there until the final shot.

Find more at Vulture and the Los Angeles Times.