Hiro Murai (born 1983) is a Japanese-American filmmaker based in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

. His most notable works include internationally successful music videos for artists such as

Childish Gambino Donald McKinley Glover Jr. (; born September 25, 1983), also known by his stage name Childish Gambino (), is an American entertainer, writer, director, and producer. After working in Derrick Comedy while studying at New York University, Glove ...

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Flying Lotus Steven Ellison (born October 7, 1983), known by his stage name Flying Lotus or sometimes FlyLo, is an American record producer, Disc jockey, DJ, filmmaker and rapper from Los Angeles. He is also the founder of the record label Brainfeeder. Flyi ...

David Guetta Pierre David Guetta ( , ; born 7 November 1967) is a French DJ and music producer. He has over 10 million album and 65 million single sales globally, with more than 10 billion streams. In 2011, 2020 and 2021, Guetta was voted the number one D ...

St. Vincent Saint Vincent may refer to: People Saints * Vincent of Saragossa (died 304), a.k.a. Vincent the Deacon, deacon and martyr * Saint Vincenca, 3rd century Roman martyress, whose relics are in Blato, Croatia * Vincent, Orontius, and Victor (died 305) ...

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Queens of the Stone Age Queens of the Stone Age (commonly abbreviated QOTSA) is an American rock band formed in 1996 in Palm Desert, California. The band was founded by vocalist and guitarist Josh Homme, who has been the only constant member throughout multiple line- ...

, and

FKA Twigs Tahliah Debrett Barnett (born 17 January 1988), known professionally as FKA Twigs (stylized as FKA twigs), is an English singer, songwriter, and dancer. Born and raised in Cheltenham, she became a backup dancer for numerous famous musicians aft ...

. He received a

Grammy Award The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pres ...

in 2019 for

Best Music Video The Grammy Award for Best Music Video is an honor presented at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, to performers, directors, and producers of quality short form music videos. Hon ...

for " This is America" with Childish Gambino. He also received five

Primetime Emmy Award The Primetime Emmy Awards, or Primetime Emmys, are part of the extensive range of Emmy Awards for artistic and technical merit for the American television industry. Bestowed by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS), the Primetime ...

nominations for the FX series ''

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'' (2016–present), and the

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limited series '' Station Eleven'' (2022). He is a frequent director of

Bill Hader William Thomas Hader Jr.''Finding Your Roots'', January 26, 2016, PBS. (born June 7, 1978) is an American actor, comedian, writer, and producer. He is the creator, producer, writer, director, and star of the HBO dark comedy series ''Barry'' (2018 ...

's HBO series ''

Barry Barry may refer to: People and fictional characters * Barry (name), including lists of people with the given name, nickname or surname, as well as fictional characters with the given name * Dancing Barry, stage name of Barry Richards (born c. 19 ...

'' (2018-present) and executive produces the Hulu series '' The Bear'' (2022-present).

Early life and education

Murai was born to Japanese popular music composer Kunihiko Murai. He moved to Los Angeles when he was nine years old. He graduated with a degree from the

USC School of Cinematic Arts The University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts (SCA) houses seven academic divisions: Film & Television Production; Cinema & Media Studies; John C. Hench Division of Animation + Digital Arts; John Wells Division of Writing for Sc ...

. After graduation, Murai turned to freelance work as the director of photography for numerous music videos, as well as

VFX Visual effects (sometimes abbreviated VFX) is the process by which imagery is created or manipulated outside the context of a live-action shot in filmmaking and video production. The integration of live-action footage and other live-action foota ...

and

storyboard A storyboard is a graphic organizer that consists of illustrations or images displayed in sequence for the purpose of pre-visualizing a motion picture, animation, motion graphic or interactive media sequence. The storyboarding process, i ...

ing, most notably for

Ace Norton Ace Norton (born May 24, 1982, in Venice, Los Angeles, California) is a Japanese American filmmaker and artist born and raised in Venice, California. Norton creates visuals on a variety of media platforms including music videos, commercials, fas ...

. After some time Murai began to direct low budget films.

Career

In 2013, he directed the short film ''

Clapping for the Wrong Reasons ''Clapping for the Wrong Reasons'' is a 2013 short film directed by Hiro Murai and written by Donald Glover. The film stars Glover and features producer Flying Lotus, actor Danielle Fishel, porn star Abella Anderson, and fellow rappers Trinidad ...

'', a companion piece for Childish Gambino's second studio album, ''

Because the Internet ''Because the Internet'' is the second studio album by American recording artist Donald Glover, under the stage name Childish Gambino. It was released on December 10, 2013, by Glassnote Records. The recording process began in 2012 and ended in O ...

'', and its attached screenplay. In the same year, he created a multi-panel video set for Frank Ocean's performance at the Grammys. Since 2016, Murai has directed several episodes of the comedy-drama ''

'', collaborating again with Donald Glover (aka Childish Gambino). For his work on the show, he has received three nominations for the

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 Outstanding Comedy Series and

Outstanding Directing for a Comedy Series The Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Comedy Series is presented to the best directing of a television comedy series. Winners and nominations 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s 2020s Total awards by netwo ...

. In 2016 he directed a

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campaign starring

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. He directed the music video for Childish Gambino's " This Is America", released on May 5, 2018, which was described as "the most talked-about music video of recent memory", and which ''Billboard'' critics ranked 10th among the "greatest music videos of the 21st century." In 2019, Murai won the

Grammy Award for Best Music Video The Grammy Award for Best Music Video is an honor presented at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, to performers, directors, and producers of quality short form music videos. Hon ...

for directing the video. In November 2018, the trailer for his debut feature film '' Guava Island'', starring Donald Glover and

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, premiered at the Pharos Festival in New Zealand. ''Guava Island'' was released on April 13, 2019, by

Amazon Studios Amazon Studios is an American television and film producer and distributor that is a subsidiary of Amazon. It specializes in developing television series and distributing and producing films. It was started in late 2010. Content is distributed th ...

through

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. On

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, the film has an approval rating of 74% based on reviews from 43 critics, with an average rating of 6.60/10. On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, it has a

weighted average The weighted arithmetic mean is similar to an ordinary arithmetic mean (the most common type of average), except that instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others. The ...

score of 64 out of 100, based on 8 reviews, indicating "generally favorable" reviews. In 2021, Murai directed the first and third episode the

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...

miniseries A miniseries or mini-series is a television series that tells a story in a predetermined, limited number of episodes. "Limited series" is another more recent US term which is sometimes used interchangeably. , the popularity of miniseries format h ...

'' Station Eleven'' for

HBO Max HBO Max is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. Launched in the United States on May 27, 2020, the service is built around the libraries of HBO, Warner Bros., Cartoon Netw ...

. In June 2018, it was announced that he would direct a science fiction feature film, ''Man Alive'', written by

David Robert Mitchell David Robert Mitchell (born October 19, 1974) is an American film director and writer. He received significant recognition as a director after completing his second feature, the critically acclaimed horror film '' It Follows'' (2014). Early life ...

Filmography

Film

Television

Music videos

Awards and nominations

*(2009) MVPA Award for Best Video under $25K. The Fray "Heartless" *(2012) Best Music Video Lists: Pitchfork /

BuzzFeed BuzzFeed, Inc. is an American Internet media, news and entertainment company with a focus on digital media. Based in New York City, BuzzFeed was founded in 2006 by Jonah Peretti and John S. Johnson III to focus on tracking viral content. Ken ...

/ Consequence of Sound / Video Static / Co.Create / NPR Music - for St. Vincent "Cheerleader" and Earl Sweatshirt "Chum" *(2013) MVPA Best Electronic Video:

- "

She Wolf ''She Wolf'' ( es, Loba, link=no) is the eighth studio album and third English-language album by Colombian singer-songwriter Shakira. It was released on 9 October 2009, by Epic Records and Sony Music Latin. As executive producers, Shakira and Am ...

" *(2014) UKMVA Director of the Year / Best Rock / Indie Video International QOTSA for ''Smooth Sailing''. *(2014) Best Music Videos Lists: The Verge, Pitchfork, IMVDB, Stereogum

References

External links

Official website
*
Hiro Murai
at the Internet Music Video Database {{DEFAULTSORT:Murai, Hiro 1983 births Living people American film directors of Japanese descent Grammy Award winners Filmmakers from California Japanese filmmakers People from Tokyo USC School of Cinematic Arts alumni Japanese emigrants to the United States