Happy 48th Birthday, Ava DuVernay! Born today in 1972, this African-American independent film distributor, writer, producer and director became the first black woman to be nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Director.
She is also the first black female director to have her film nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture.
During her summer vacations, DuVernay would travel to the childhood home of her stepfather, which was not far from Selma, Alabama. DuVernay said that these summers influenced the making of 'Selma', as her father saw the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches.
In 1990, DuVernay graduated from Saint Joseph High School in Lakewood. Later at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), she was a double B.A. major in English literature and African-American studies.
DuVernay's first interest was in journalism, a choice influenced by an internship with CBS News, where she was assigned to help cover the O.J. Simpson murder trial.
Eventually, DuVernay became disillusioned with journalism, however, and decided to move into public relations, working as a junior publicist at 20th Century Fox.
In 1999, She opened her own public relations firm, The DuVernay Agency, (also known as DVAPR).
Through DVAPR, she provided marketing and PR services to the entertainment and lifestyle industry, working on campaigns for films and television shows.
Most notably, these included 'Spy Kids' (2001), 'Shrek 2' (2004), Steven Spielberg's 'The Terminal' (2004), Michael Mann's 'Collateral' (2004) and 'Dreamgirls' (2006).
In 2005, over the Christmas holiday, DuVernay decided to take $6,000 and write and direct her first film.
This turned out to be the twelve-minute 2006 American drama/short film 'Saturday Night Life'. The film was based on her mother's own experiences.
Two years later, DuVernay made her feature directorial debut. This was the 2008 American alternative hip hop documentary film 'This Is the Life'.
The film told of a history of LA's Good Life Cafe's arts movement, in which she participated as part of the American hip hop duo Figures of Speech.
In 2010, it was announced that Disney carried the film rights to American writer of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and young adult fiction Madeleine L'Engle's 1962 American young adult fantasy fiction novel A Wrinkle in Time.
In the summer of 2011, DuVernay began production on her second narrative feature film for the following year, which was the 2012 American independent/drama feature film 'Middle of Nowhere'.
The film was from a script that she had written in 2003 but could not get financed then.
In January, she won the directing award in the U.S. dramatic competition at the 34th Sundance Film Festival, where it had its world premiere.
The film played in United States dramatic competition and garnered the U.S. Directing Award: Dramatic for DuVernay. She was the first African-American woman to ever win the award.
The following year, DuVernay also won the Independent Spirit John Cassavetes Award for her work on the film at the 28th Independent Spirit Awards in late February 2013.
On August 5, 2014, American screenwriter, film director, playwright, and chief creative officer of Walt Disney Animation Studios Jennifer Lee was announced as the screenwriter for 'A Wrinkle in Time'.
Lee had taken over from American screenwriter Jeff Stockwell, who had written the first draft.
Later that same year, DuVernay's 2014 British/American/French drama/historical drama film 'Selma' was released. Oprah Winfrey and Brad Pitt served as co-producers.
DuVernay had made uncredited re-writes of most of the original screenplay by British screenwriter and playwright Paul Webb in order to emphasize King and the people of Selma as central figures.
In response to criticism by some historians and media sources who accused her of irresponsibly rewriting history to portray her own agenda, DuVernay said that the film is "not a documentary. I'm not a historian. I'm a storyteller".
The film premiered at the American Film Institute Festival on November 11, 2014, began a limited American release on December 25, and expanded into wide theatrical release on January 9, 2015.
This was two months before the 50th anniversary of the march. The film was re-released on March 20, 2015 in honor of the 50th anniversary of the historical march.
The following year, 'Selma' was nominated for Best Picture and Best Original Song. However, it won none of these. This occurred at the 87th Academy Awards in late February 2015.
On February 8, 2016, it was reported that DuVernay had been offered to direct 'A Wrinkle in Time' and that she was confirmed as director later that same month.
Later that same year, DuVernay co-wrote, co-produced and directed the film of which she is best known. This was the 2016 American documentary/history film '13th', and was released on Netflix.
In the film, DuVernay explores the history of racial inequality in the United States, focusing on the fact that the nation's prisons are disproportionately filled with African-Americans.
The film is titled after the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, adopted in 1865, which abolished slavery throughout the United States and ended involuntary servitude except as a punishment for conviction of a crime.
Upon release, '13th' garnered acclaim from a number of film critics the following year, it was nominated an Oscar for Best Documentary Feature. This occurred at the 89th Academy Awards in late February 2017.
Later that same year, '13th' won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Documentary or Nonfiction Special. This occurred at the 69th Primetime Emmy Awards in mid-September 2017.
During the time the release of '13th', the first episode of American drama television series Queen Sugar (2016–present) aired on the Oprah Winfrey Network. Created by DuVernay, she, along with Winfrey, serve as executive producers.
The series is based on African-American author, filmmaker and teacher Natalie Baszile's titular 2014 mystery contemporary literature domestic fiction novel.
Also, during this time, filming for 'A Wrinkle in Time' had begun in November 2016. DuVernay was the first woman of color to direct a live-action film with a budget of over $100 million.
She was also and the second woman to do so after American film and television director and screenwriter Patty Jenkins, who is known for directing the 2017 American superhero action/war film 'Wonder Woman'.
'A Wrinkle in Time' was released almost two years after '13th'. The film brought in $33 million its opening weekend.
It was second at the box office behind African-American film director, producer, and screenwriter Ryan Coogler's 2018 American superhero fantasy/science fiction film 'Black Panther', which was released ten days earlier.
Upon release, 'A Wrinkle in Time' received mixed reviews, with critics "taking issue with the film's heavy use of CGI and numerous plot holes" while "celebrating its message of female empowerment and diversity."
One year later, Netflix had given the production of DuVernay's 2019 American crime drama web television miniseries When They see Us (2019–present). DuVernay also served as executive producer, co-writer and director.
The series tells how, in 1989, a jogger was assaulted and raped in New York's Central Park. Subsequently, five young people were charged with the crime.
The quintet, labeled the Central Park Five, maintained its innocence and spent years fighting the convictions, hoping to be exonerated.
This limited series spans a quarter of a century, from when the teenagers are first questioned about the incident in the spring of 1989, going through their exoneration in 2002 and ultimately the settlement reached with the city of New York in 2014.
Upon its release, When They See Us received critical universal acclaim. On June 25, 2019, Netflix announced that the miniseries had been streamed by over twenty-three million viewers within its first month of release.
According to DuVernay's personal life, as of January 2019, she is thought to have never been married, nor have children. There is some evidence she is dating Common, although no official announcement has been made to that effect.
According to DuVernay's styles and themes, American activist cinematic practice author Michael T. Martin says, "DuVernay is among the vanguard of a new generation of black filmmakers who are the busily undeterred catalyst for what may very well be a black film renaissance in the making."
He further speaks of DuVernay's mission and "call to action" which constitutes a strategy "to further and foster the black cinematic image in an organized and consistent way, and to not have to defer and ask permission to traffic our films: to be self-determining."
DuVernay has been active from 1999–present.
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