Age: 53
female
Ava Marie DuVernay (/ˌdjuːvərˈneɪ/; born August 24, 1972) is an American filmmaker, screenwriter, and producer. She is a recipient of two Primetime Emmy Awards, two NAACP Image Awards, a BAFTA Film Award, and a BAFTA TV Award, as well as a nominee for an Academy Award and a Golden Globe. In 2011, she founded her independent distribution company ARRAY. After making her directorial debut with 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 $100 million budget. 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. Description above from the Wikipedia article Ava DuVernay, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
In the heart of 18th-century America, amidst the cruelty of slavery and the birth of a nation, a remarkable voice rises—Phillis Wheatley, a young African girl who would become one of the first published Black poets in history. A Voice Unchained is the powerful and inspiring biopic that chronicles her journey from enslavement to literary icon, overcoming unimaginable odds to reshape the boundaries of identity, race, and artistic freedom. Torn from her homeland at the age of seven and sold into slavery, Phillis is purchased by the Wheatley family of Boston. Though enslaved, her intellect and passion for learning draw the attention of her owners, who educate her in classical literature, history, and theology—an unthinkable opportunity for someone in her position. Yet her brilliance transcends even these boundaries. This film follows Phillis’s ascent as she writes poetry that captivates colonial America and the Atlantic world, challenging deeply rooted prejudices and the dehumanizing institution of slavery. As her fame grows, she travels to London to publish her work and meets prominent abolitionists while navigating the complex and often painful contradictions of her success as both an acclaimed poet and an enslaved woman.
