Ava DuVernay

Ava Marie DuVernay (; born August 24, 1972) is an American filmmaker, screenwriter, and producer. She is a recipient of two Primetime Emmy Awards, two NAACP Image Award, a BAFTA Film Award, and a BAFTA TV Award, as well as a nominee for an Academy Award and Golden Globe. In 2011, she founded her independent distribution company ARRAY.

After making her directoral debut, ''I Will Follow'' (2010), DuVernay won the directing award in the U.S. dramatic competition at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival for her second feature film ''Middle of Nowhere'', becoming the first black woman to win the award.

For her work on ''Selma'' (2014), a biopic about Martin Luther King Jr., DuVernay became the first African-American woman to be nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Director; the film went on to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture. Her other film credits include the Academy Award-nominated Netflix documentary ''13th'' (2016) and the Disney fantasy film ''A Wrinkle in Time'' (2018), the latter making her the first African-American woman to direct a film with a budget of $100 million. In 2023, she directed the biographical film ''Origin'' based on Isabel Wilkerson's book ''Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents'' (2020).

DuVernay's television credits include the OWN drama series ''Queen Sugar'' (2016) and two Netflix drama limited series: ''When They See Us'' (2019), based on the 1989 Central Park jogger case and ''Colin in Black & White'' (2021), based on the teenage years of NFL player Colin Kaepernick.

In 2017, DuVernay was included on the annual ''Time'' 100 list of the most influential people in the world. In 2020, she was elected to the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences board of governors as part of the directors branch. Provided by Wikipedia