Tanya Hamilton (born in

Spanish Town, Jamaica Spanish Town ( jam, label= Jamaican Creole, Panish Tong) is the capital and the largest town in the parish of St. Catherine in the historic county of Middlesex, Jamaica. It was the Spanish and British capital of Jamaica from 1534 until 1872. T ...

) is an American film director and producer. She came to the United States at the age of eight, and settled in Maryland with her mother. She attended

Duke Ellington School of the Arts The Duke Ellington School of the Arts (established 1974) is a high school located at 35th Street and R Street, Northwest, Washington, D.C., and dedicated to arts education. One of the high schools of the District of Columbia Public School syst ...

Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art (Cooper Union) is a private college at Cooper Square in New York City. Peter Cooper founded the institution in 1859 after learning about the government-supported École Polytechnique in ...

, and

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manha ...

. Hamilton's first project was a short film entitled ''The Killers'', which was released in 1997. This work won awards at the

Berlin International Film Festival The Berlin International Film Festival (german: Internationale Filmfestspiele Berlin), usually called the Berlinale (), is a major international film festival held annually in Berlin, Germany. Founded in 1951 and originally run in June, the festi ...

and

New Line Cinema New Line Cinema is an American film production studio owned by Warner Bros. Discovery and is a film label of Warner Bros. It was founded in 1967 by Robert Shaye as an independent film distribution company; later becoming a film studio after ...

. Her first feature film was ''

Night Catches Us ''Night Catches Us'' is a 2010 drama film directed and written by Tanya Hamilton and stars Kerry Washington, Anthony Mackie, Jamie Hector, Wendell Pierce and Novella Nelson. Plot In 1976, former Black Panther Marcus ( Anthony Mackie) returns to ...

'', a portrayal of former Black Panthers reuniting in 1976

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

. In 2011, Hamilton received an Athena Film Festival award for directing, as well as

Black Reel Award The Black Reel Awards, or BRAs, is an annual American awards ceremony hosted by the Foundation for the Augmentation of African-Americans in Film (FAAAF) to recognize excellence of African Americans, as well as the cinematic achievements of the Af ...

nomination for best director for this film. It was also nominated for an

Independent Spirit Awards The Independent Spirit Awards (abbreviated Spirit Awards and originally known as the FINDIE or Friends of Independents Awards), founded in 1984, are awards dedicated to independent filmmakers. Winners were typically presented with acrylic glass ...

, four Image Awards, a

Gotham Awards The Gotham Awards () are American film awards, presented annually to the makers of independent films at a ceremony in New York City, the city first nicknamed "Gotham" by native son Washington Irving, in an issue of ''Salmagundi'', published on ...

and the

Sundance Film Festival The Sundance Film Festival (formerly Utah/US Film Festival, then US Film and Video Festival) is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with more than 46,6 ...

Grand Jury Prize.

Filmography

Film Television

References

External links

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Columbia University School Of The Arts FilmTanys Hamilton's interview at NY TIMES
American film directors Screenwriters from Maryland Jamaican emigrants to the United States American women film directors Columbia University alumni Living people People educated at Woldingham School American women screenwriters Year of birth missing (living people) People from Spanish Town American women television directors American television directors 21st-century American women {{US-film-director-stub