fiction.wikisort.org - Director

Shaka King (born March 7, 1980) is an American film director, screenwriter, and film producer. He is best known for directing and co-writing the 2021 biopic Judas and the Black Messiah.

Shaka King
King at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival
Born	(1980-03-07) March 7, 1980 (age 42) New York City, U.S.
Alma mater	New York University Vassar College
Occupation	Filmmaker writer director
Years active	2009–present

Biography

An only child, King was born on March 7, 1980^{[citation needed]} in Crown Heights and grew up in Bedford-Stuyvesant, both in Brooklyn, New York.[1][2] His mother's family was from Barbados and Panama, while his father's family was from Panama.[3] Both parents worked as public school teachers.[1] King's early education occurred in the neighborhoods of East Harlem and Fort Greene.[3] He attended a predominantly white preparatory school in Bay Ridge during his middle and high school years.[4] It was in high school that he discovered his passion for creative writing.[1]

King studied political science and took his first film production course at Vassar College. After graduating, he practiced screenwriting while working as a youth counselor and tutor.[1] In 2007, he entered a graduate film program at New York University Tisch School of the Arts where he was a student of Spike Lee.[5] King's thesis for his masters of fine arts resulted in the feature film Newlyweeds.[2]

King currently lives in the borough of Brooklyn.[6]

Career

King's debut feature film Newlyweeds is about a free-spirited young couple who live in Bedford-Stuyvesant and who prefer to indulge in marijuana and hashish.[7] The film premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival. He presented his next film, Mulignans, in the USA Narrative Short Films program at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival.[8] His 2017 short film LaZercism, starring Lakeith Stanfield, tells of a world in which white people suffer from “racist glaucoma,” a disease that prevents them from being aware of their black fellow citizens.[9] Stanfield also appears in King's second feature film Judas and the Black Messiah, in which Daniel Kaluuya plays the role of Fred Hampton.[1] More recently, he got a first-look deal with FX Productions to develop his first TV series.[10][11]

Filmography

Films

Year	Title	Credited as
		Director	Writer	Producer
2013	Newlyweeds	Yes	Yes	Yes
2021	Judas and the Black Messiah	Yes	Yes	Yes

Short films

Year	Title	Credited as
		Director	Writer	Producer
2009	Mariachi	No	No	Yes
2009	Cocoa Loco	Yes	No	No
2010	Herkimer DuFrayne 7th Grade Guidance Counselor	Yes	Yes	Yes
2015	Mulignans	Yes	Yes	Yes
2017	LaZercism	Yes	Yes	Yes

Television

Year	Title	Credited as		Number of Episodes
		Director	Writer
2016	High Maintenance	Yes	Yes	2
2016-17	People of Earth	Yes	No	5
2018	Random Acts of Flyness	No	Yes	1
2019-20	Shrill	Yes	No	4

Awards and nominations

Year	Award	Title	Category	Result	Ref
2020	NAACP Image Awards	Shrill	Outstanding Directing in a Comedy Series	Nominated	[12]
2021	Academy Awards	Judas and the Black Messiah	Best Picture	Nominated
			Best Original Screenplay	Nominated
2021	Producers Guild of America Awards		Best Theatrical Motion Picture	Nominated
2021	Writers Guild of America Awards		Best Original Screenplay	Nominated

References

External links

• Shaka King at IMDb 
• Shaka King at Metacritic
• Shaka King at Rotten Tomatoes
• Feature Filmmakers Making Short Films with Shaka King and Zach Heinzerling on YouTube

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