Tribeca Festival opens 25th anniversary with Questlove’s Earth, Wind, & Fire documentary

 

Tribeca Festival opens its 25th anniversary with Questlove’s Earth, Wind, & Fire documentary

The 2026 Tribeca Festival opened its 25th anniversary edition on June 3 at the Beacon Theatre with the world premiere of HBO’s “Earth, Wind, & Fire (To Be Celestial vs. That’s the Weight of the World),” a new documentary directed by Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson.

The film celebrates the music, visuals, joy, and spiritual imagination of Earth, Wind, & Fire, the groundbreaking group founded by Maurice White. Known for blending funk, soul, R&B, jazz, pop, and African diasporic influences, the band helped shape the sound and look of American popular music for generations.

Questlove, the Grammy- and Academy Award-winning musician, filmmaker, and co-founder of the Roots, has become a key cultural historian through film. His documentary “Summer of Soul,” about the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature and brought renewed attention to a major African American music event that had long been overlooked.

At the Beacon Theatre, Questlove was joined by Earth, Wind, & Fire members Philip Bailey, Verdine White, and Ralph Johnson. The evening also brought out Roots members Ray Angry and Tariq “Black Thought” Trotter, along with Flavor Flav, Chuck D, Jimmy Jam, and H.E.R.

Before the screening, Tribeca Festival co-founders Robert De Niro and Jane Rosenthal welcomed the audience and marked the festival’s 25th edition. Their remarks reflected on Tribeca’s beginnings and its growth over the past quarter-century into one of New York’s major film and cultural events.

The opening-night selection was a fitting choice for an anniversary year. Earth, Wind & Fire’s music has remained part of American life for decades, appearing in concerts, family gatherings, dance floors, and film soundtracks. The band’s songs carry celebration, but also discipline, craft, and a sense of possibility.

After the premiere, Earth, Wind, & Fire and the Roots performed live, giving the night the feeling of both a film event and a concert. The performance brought the documentary’s subject directly into the room, reminding the audience about why the band’s legacy endures.

For Tribeca, the evening opened the festival with a clear message: Some stories are not only preserved on screen; they are carried through music, memory, and the people who keep singing them back.