Selma director Ava DuVernay is an inspiration to women and black filmmakers everywhere, but while she may have a new show on Oprah Winfrey’s OWN (Queen Sugar, based on the novel by Natalie Baszile) and an upcoming Netflix documentary (The 13th, about mass incarceration), she had a long journey to get to where she is.
She knows family is what you make it
According to The Reel Network, DuVernay was not raised by her biological father, as her parents divorced when she was a child. She was raised by her mother and stepfather.
She’s from Compton
DuVernay grew up in the Los Angeles neighborhood made famous by N.W.A.
She loves her siblings
DuVernay has five siblings: Jina, Tera, Lashica, Kris and Nic.
She loves hip-hop
Growing up, DuVernay had an interest in hip-hop and rhyming, reports Biography. Clearly the interest hasn’t faded: She shared this Instagram pic of herself at Amoeba Music, checking out the hip-hop documentaries.
She is a UCLA alum
DuVernay, a Los Angeles native, graduated from UCLA, where she double-majored in English and African-American studies.
She started in publicity
DuVernay wasn’t always a director. Before she helmed her first film, DuVernay opened up her own public relations firm, the DuVernay Agency, in 1999.
She was a journalist
After college, DuVernay decided to pursue broadcast journalism. However, her experience working on the O.J. Simpson trial caused her to switch gears.
She made a movie about Venus Williams
In 2013, DuVernay made a film about tennis star Venus Williams and her fight for equal pay at Wimbledon. Of the film, titled Venus VS., DuVernay stated: “People in the United States should know of her true professional bravery and personal tenacity in making sure women athletes are regarded and rewarded on par with their male counterparts. This is my mission.”
She was in a sorority
While at UCLA, DuVernay was a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha, a historically black sorority. In 2015, DuVernay criticized VH1’s series Sorority Sisters for its portrayal of black sorority girls.
She directed an episode of ‘Scandal’
Remember the episode in which President Fitz takes Olivia to see the house he’s built for her in Vermont? You can thank DuVernay for that romantic Season 3 episode, titled “Vermont Is for Lovers, Too.”
Roger Ebert adored her work
Film critic Roger Ebert loved her first narrative film I Will Follow so much that he championed the director until his death.
Her first film was a documentary
Though DuVernay is famous for films like Selma, her very first feature was the documentary This Is the Life, about the history of Los Angeles’ Good Life Cafe’s arts movement.
She has a podcast
In 2013, DuVernay started the podcast The Call-In, in which she plays recorded phone conversations she had with black filmmakers.
‘Middle of Nowhere’ made history
DuVernay’s 2012 film Middle of Nowhere, about a woman who struggles with her husband’s incarceration, earned her the Best Director Award at the Sundance Film Festival. She was the first African-American woman to win the award.
‘Selma’ was important to her dad
According to her interview with Oprah Winfrey, DuVernay’s father got emotional when he came to watch her on the set of her Best Picture-nominated feature. DuVernay’s father, Murray Maye, grew up in Alabama during the civil rights movement, so watching his daughter direct it as history was a major moment for him. DuVernay told Winfrey, “He just steps into downtown Montgomery, which has been transformed into 1965. [There’s] a lot of turmoil and history around that that’s very toxic to people that are from there… And so to see his daughter, a black woman, say, ‘Cut,’ [and] everyone stops. And ‘Action,’ and everyone starts. You know, he’s talked to me about how big a moment that was for him.”
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