Travon Free (born ) is an American

comedian A comedian or comic is a person who seeks to entertain an audience by making them laugh. This might be through jokes or amusing Amusement is the state of experiencing humorous and entertaining events or situations while the person or a ...

, actor and writer. He has written for ''

Full Frontal with Samantha Bee ''Full Frontal with Samantha Bee'' is an American late-night talk and news satire television program that aired on TBS from 2016 to 2022. The show was hosted by comedian Samantha Bee, a former correspondent on ''The Daily Show''. In July 202 ...

'', ''

The Daily Show ''The Daily Show'' is an American late-night talk and satirical news television program. It airs each Monday through Thursday on Comedy Central with release shortly after on Paramount+. ''The Daily Show'' draws its comedy and satire form from ...

'' on

Comedy Central Comedy Central is an American basic cable channel owned by Paramount Global through its network division's MTV Entertainment Group unit, based in Manhattan. The channel is geared towards young adults aged 18–34 and carries comedy programming ...

, and ''

Any Given Wednesday with Bill Simmons ''Any Given Wednesday with Bill Simmons'' was an American talk show hosted by Bill Simmons. The series premiered on June 22, 2016, on HBO. On November 4, 2016, HBO announced it had canceled the series. Episodes Reception Ratings According to N ...

'' on

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American premium television network, which is the flagship property of namesake parent subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is ba ...

. Free won an

Emmy Award The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...

for his work on ''The Daily Show'' and won an

Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...

for ''

Two Distant Strangers ''Two Distant Strangers'' is a 2020 American short film written by Travon Free and directed by Free and Martin Desmond Roe. The film examines the deaths of Black Americans during encounters with police through the eyes of a character trapped in a ...

'' in the

Best Live Action Short Film The Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film is an award presented at the annual Academy Awards ceremony. The award has existed, under various names, since 1957. From 1936 until 1956 there were two separate awards, "Best Short Subject, One- ...

category.

Early life and education

Growing up with his mother and grandmother in

Compton, California Compton is a city in southern Los Angeles County, California, United States, situated south of downtown Los Angeles. Compton is one of the oldest cities in the county and, on May 11, 1888, was the eighth city in Los Angeles County to incorporat ...

, Free attended

Dominguez High School Manuel Dominguez High School is a four-year public high school located in Compton, California. It is part of the Compton Unified School District. Name Dominguez High School is named after Don Manuel Domínguez, a California rancher. Domínguez in ...

, where he played

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

; in 2002, the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...

'' called him the "team's best player". He attended

California State University, Long Beach California State University, Long Beach (CSULB) is a public research university in Long Beach, California. The 322-acre campus is the second largest of the 23-school California State University system (CSU) and one of the largest universities i ...

, and played

college basketball In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...

for the

Long Beach State 49ers Long Beach State athletics, or simply Beach athletics (previously known as the 49ers), are the athletic teams that represent California State University, Long Beach. Teams compete in 19 sports at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NC ...

. While injured with a

torn meniscus A tear of a meniscus is a rupturing of one or more of the fibrocartilage strips in the knee called menisci. When doctors and patients refer to "torn cartilage" in the knee, they actually may be referring to an injury to a meniscus at the top of ...

in his right knee that required surgery, he entertained the team with his humor, which was a prelude to his career in comedy. In college, Free took a comedy writing class and performed at

Laugh Factory Laugh Factory is a chain of comedy clubs in the United States. The chain is owned by Laugh Factory Inc., and the founder and current chief executive is Jamie Masada. Endurance record The Laugh Factory keeps track of an endurance record fo ...

Hollywood Hollywood usually refers to: * Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California * Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States Hollywood may also refer to: Places United States * Hollywood District (disambiguation) * Hollywood, ...

and The Ice House Club in

Pasadena, California Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commercial district. I ...

Career

In 2011, Free started out as a regular host of an online series The Gentlemen's Rant. Free began writing for ''

'' in October 2012, after coming in second place in a contest to win a position working for the show. For his work there, he won a

Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Variety Series The Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Variety Series debuted in 1966, and has been annually awarded most years since the mid-1960s. It has had a large number of name changes, mostly involving the addition or subtraction of the wo ...

in 2015. He has also had

recurring role A recurring character is a fictional character, usually in a prime time TV series, who frequently appears from time to time during the series' run. Recurring characters often play major roles in more than one episode, sometimes being the main foc ...

s on the shows ''

Tosh.0 ''Tosh.0'' ( ) is an American television series that aired on Comedy Central from June 4, 2009, to November 24, 2020. The series is hosted and produced by comedian Daniel Tosh, who provides satirical commentary on online viral video clips, inter ...

'' and ''

Chelsea Lately ''Chelsea Lately'' is an American Late night television, late night Television comedy, comedy talk show created by Brody Stevens and hosted by comedian Chelsea Handler which was broadcast on E! The show debuted on July 16, 2007, and was produced ...

''. In 2016, Free wrote for the HBO show '' Any Given Wednesday'', and the following year he was hired as a writer for ''

''. In 2018, he appeared on the cover of

Gay Times ''Gay Times'' (stylized in all caps), also known as ''Gay Times Magazine'' and as ''GT'', is a UK-based LGBTQ+ media brand established in 1975. Originally a magazine for gay and bisexual men, the company now includes content for the LGBTQ+ commu ...

. He was a producer that year on the HBO series ''

Camping Camping is an outdoor activity involving overnight stays away from home, either without shelter or using basic shelter such as a tent, or a recreational vehicle. Typically, participants leave developed areas to spend time outdoors in more nat ...

''. In 2019, Free joined other

Writers Guild of America The Writers Guild of America is the joint efforts of two different US labor unions representing TV and film writers: * The Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE), headquartered in New York City and affiliated with the AFL–CIO * The Writers Guil ...

members in firing his agents as part of the Guild's stand against the

Association of Talent Agents The Association of Talent Agents (ATA) is a non-profit trade association representing talent agencies in the United States entertainment industry. ATA agencies represent the vast majority of artists working in the field, including actors, direc ...

and the practice of

packaging Packaging is the science, art and technology of enclosing or protecting products for distribution, storage, sale, and use. Packaging also refers to the process of designing, evaluating, and producing packages. Packaging can be described as a co ...

. Free wrote and co-directed ''

'', which won the

Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film The Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film is an award presented at the annual Academy Awards ceremony. The award has existed, under various names, since 1957. From 1936 until 1956 there were two separate awards, "Best Short Subject, One- ...

in 2021.

Controversy

In November 2018, after a series of

anti-Semitic Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

tweets from 2010 and 2011 were discovered in Free's

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

feed, HBO said that the company had no plans to work with him in the future and stated that "This kind of language is deeply offensive and inexcusable." Free apologized, saying that the tweets were "stupid and really offensive jokes." Controversy emerged in April 2021, after Cynthia Kao posted a video on the social media site TikTok, alleging that Free's ''Two Distant Strangers'' was

plagiarized Plagiarism is the fraudulent representation of another person's language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions as one's own original work.From the 1995 '' Random House Compact Unabridged Dictionary'': use or close imitation of the language and thought ...

from a comedy sketch she had directed in December 2016 titled ''Groundhog Day For a Black Man''. The plot of Kao's film, she claims, is similar to the plot of ''Two Distant Strangers'', which are both about a black man trying to relive the same day over and over until he can survive a police altercation. Furthermore, in 2020, during the

George Floyd protests The George Floyd protests were a series of protests and civil unrest against police brutality and racism that began in Minneapolis on May 26, 2020, and largely took place during 2020. The civil unrest and protests began as part of internati ...

, social media news outlet

NowThis NowThis News is a progressive social media-focused news organization founded in 2012. The company posts short (in most cases 15 seconds long) news videos and hyperpartisan content. History NowThis News was founded by ''Huffington Post'' co-fo ...

contacted Kao about featuring the film on their Facebook and Instagram pages. The following year,

Netflix Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fil ...

released ''Two Distant Strangers'' in collaboration with

, excluding any credit of Kao's name or that she had anything to do with the original idea for the movie in any way.

Personal life

In 2011, Free

came out Coming out of the closet, often shortened to coming out, is a metaphor used to describe LGBT people's self-disclosure of their sexual orientation, romantic orientation, or gender identity. Framed and debated as a privacy issue, coming out of ...

bisexual Bisexuality is a romantic or sexual attraction or behavior toward both males and females, or to more than one gender. It may also be defined to include romantic or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity, whi ...

. He lives between New York and Los Angeles and collects shoes. In 2021, at the

93rd Academy Awards The 93rd Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), honored films released from January 1, 2020, to February 28, 2021, at Union Station in Los Angeles. The ceremony was held on April 25, 2021 ...

, Free wore a black and yellow

Dolce & Gabbana Dolce & Gabbana (), also known by initials D&G, is an Italian luxury fashion house founded in 1985 in Legnano by Italian designers Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana. The house specializes in ready-to-wear, handbags, accessories, and cosmetic ...

tuxedo the jacket of which's inner lining had listed on it the names of African Americans shot and killed by the police.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Free, Travon American male actors American stand-up comedians American television writers Bisexual sportspeople Bisexual male actors LGBT basketball players Living people Long Beach State Beach men's basketball players American male television writers People from Compton, California Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century American comedians Screenwriters from California Comedians from California American men's basketball players 21st-century American screenwriters Directors of Live Action Short Film Academy Award winners 21st-century American male writers

Early life and education

Career

Controversy

Personal life

See also

References