Test: Matthew Morrison's award-winning gay bodybuilding drama finds a distributor

Test, the queer bodybuilding drama that has been collecting prizes on the LGBTQ+ festival circuit this year, has been acquired by Dark Star Pictures.

The deal gives the film, which features Glee's Matthew Morrison, a route to audiences beyond the festivals that have championed it since its premiere in June, although a release date has not yet been announced and there is no word so far on a UK cinema release.

Directed by Sam McConnell, the film is written by and stars Brock Yurich, for whom it marks a first feature screenplay and the end of a journey that took around a decade. It is a deeply personal project for Yurich, and that closeness to the material is a large part of why critics and festival juries have responded to it so warmly.

Yurich plays Eddie, an amateur bodybuilder in small-town Ohio who lives with his religious mother Joanne, played by Tammy Blanchard, and makes money as a cam model while chasing success on the competition stage.

Life starts to look up when he begins working with a new coach, Mike, played by Mike Edward, and reconnects with Abby, his high school sweetheart, who has come home to teach ballet. Paloma Garcia-Lee plays Abby, while Morrison, still best known to many viewers as Mr Schue, takes the role of Pastor Gregg. Evan Hall also appears.

The film had its world premiere at SXSW London before travelling to the Provincetown International Film Festival, Frameline in San Francisco and Outfest in Los Angeles, and in September it screened at the Deauville American Film Festival in France.

At Frameline's 50th edition it shared the Outstanding First Narrative Feature Award with Adrian Chiarella's Leviticus after the vote ended in a statistical tie, with the jury praising Yurich's "volcanic star-making turn". In Sydney, it took first place in the Emerging Narrative Feature Competition at Queer Screen Film Fest.

What sets Test apart is its setting. Sports dramas with gay leads remain rare, and bodybuilding, a world built around the body, image and performance, gives the story a natural tension for a young man who is still working out who he is.

Placing that story inside a devout household in rural Ohio adds another layer, and it is a combination few LGBTQ+ films have tried.

Watch the official trailer:

With a distributor now on board, the next piece of news fans will be waiting for is a confirmed release date, and after a run of festival prizes on two continents, Test is shaping up to be one of the queer films to look out for when it reaches wider audiences.

Morrison's name will also catch the eye of Glee fans at a busy time for the show, which is being revived, as we reported in our story on the Glee reboot and its LGBTQ+ characters.

UK Release dates:

Following its successful festival run in June 2026, the film was officially acquired by Dark Star Pictures. They have scheduled the general theatrical rollout for 2027. An exact, wide-circuit UK cinema release date within 2027 has not yet been finalized

Images: Tandem Pictures.