David Oyelowo says 'United Kingdom' love story is 'timely' and 'timeless'

Feb. 9 (UPI) -- Actor David Oyelowo says his fact-based, period romance A United Kingdom is both a "timely" and "timeless" story.

Directed by Amma Assante and starting in 1947, the film follows Oyelowo's Seretse Khama, king of Botswana, as he meets Rosamund Pike's Ruth Williams and falls in love with the office worker while wrapping up his education in London. Despite intense opposition from their families and the British government, the interracial couple fights to make a life together.

Asked by UPI in New York this week what it is like to put out in the world now a story about love affecting change, Oyelowo replied: "A lot of people have said the film is very timely. I think it is, but it is also timeless. I don't know that there is ever a time where we feel like: 'Yeah, we've got this love thing down. It's fine. Oh, United Kingdom, yeah, it's just what's happening right now.' That just ... unfortunately seems to be the way we have been going. But, yes, I am a big believer in the power of love to heal, the power of love to obliterate those things that are different about us and make us recognize that we are so much more alike than we are different across racial lines, gender lines, age lines, religious lines. So, yes, for me, the film is, hopefully, a tonic for people right now."

Co-starring Terry Pheto, Tom Felton, Laura Carmichael, Jack Davenport and Jessica Oyelowo, A United Kingdom opens in U.S. theaters Friday.

Their love defied an empire and inspired the world.#AUnitedKingdom opens in select theaters February 10 // https://t.co/xsbMmOwPjX pic.twitter.com/VwfWfUDK8K

— A United Kingdom (@_aunitedkingdom) January 30, 2017