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Roger Ross Williams | |
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 Williams in April 2016 | |
| Born | (1962-09-16)September 16, 1962 (age 63) Easton, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
| Occupations | Film director Screenwriter Film producer |
| Years active | 1995–present |
Roger Ross Williams (born September 16, 1962) is an American director, producer and writer and the firstAfrican American director to win anAcademy Award (Oscar), with his short filmMusic by Prudence; this film won theAcademy Award for Best Documentary Short Film in 2009.[1]
Williams was born September 16, 1962, inEaston, Pennsylvania, in theLehigh Valley region of easternPennsylvania. He is a member of aGullah family fromSouth Carolina. Williams attendedEaston Area High School and thenNorthampton Community College inBethlehem, Pennsylvania andNew York University in New York City.
Williams began his career in 1985, producingpolitical satire forComedy Central andMichael Moore's Emmy Award-winning seriesTV Nation. He has since produced and directed forNBC News,MSNBC,BBC,CNN and has produced work forComedy Central,Food Network,TLC,VH1, including numerous primetime specials forPublic Broadcasting Service (PBS),American Broadcasting Company (ABC) andABC News,CBS,Sundance Channel and New York Times Television. He has also produced a documentary series forDiscovery Networks and a lifestyle series,Sheila Bridges Designer Living, for Scripps Networks. He has won numerous awards for his TV work including a NAMIC Vision Award and the National Headliner for Best Human Interest Feature documentary.
Williams has directed a number of films includingLife, Animated, which won theSundance Film Festival Directing Award, was nominated for anAcademy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film[2] and won threeEmmy Awards in 2018, including the award for Best Documentary. The filmGod Loves Uganda that he directed, which was shortlisted for anAcademy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film andAmerican Jail, examined theU.S. prison system and premiered on CNN and the BBC. Williams directedTraveling While Black, avirtual reality documentary / transmedia project made for Facebook'sOculus, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2019.[3] His 2019 filmThe Apollo, a documentary about Harlem's legendaryApollo Theater, was the opening night film of the 2019Tribeca Film Festival.[citation needed]
His first narrative feature film,Cassandro, was released byAmazon Studios in 2023.[4] His production company, One Story Up, which he co-founded with Geoff Martz,[5] has produced a variety of documentary projects. In 2020, they executive produced theBetween The World and Me special for HBO, based on the eponymous book by Ta-Nehisi Coates.[6] The following year, they producedHigh On The Hog: How African American Cuisine Transformed America for Netflix, with Williams directing. The series won a 2021 Peabody Award.[7] In 2023, the company released several projects includingStamped From The Beginning (nominated for a 2024 Primetime Emmy for Exceptional Merit In Documentary Filmmaking 2024),[8]The Super Models,The 1619 Project (winner of the 2023 Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Documentary Or Nonfiction Series),[9] andLove To Love You, Donna Summer.
The documentary filmMaster of Light, directed by Rosa Ruth Boesten and produced by Ilja Roomans, Anousha Nzume and Williams, was played at the music and film festivalSouth by Southwest (SXSW) in March 2022.[10] It is a production of One Story Up and the Dutch documentary collective 'Docmakers'.[11] It is a film about the artist George Anthony Morton.[12][13] The film was included inHBO Max that same year.
Williams is the firstAfrican American director to win anAcademy Award with his short filmMusic by Prudence; this film won theAcademy Award for Best Documentary Short Film in 2009.
Williams serves on the board of Docubox Kenya, a documentary fund and mentorship program based inNairobi that supports African filmmakers. Williams serves on the alumni advisor board of None On Record, the alumni advisory board of theSundance Institute, and, since 2016, the Board of Governors for theAcademy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, serving as chair of the Documentary Branch and the Documentary Diversity Committee. He is also a trustee of theZeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa, the first major museum in Africa dedicated to contemporary art.[14] Furthermore, he is a member of the Advisory Board ofFull Frame Documentary Film Festival, and of the board of theTribeca Film Institute.
Confronting the way we understand and talk about race in America, this virtual reality documentary immerses the viewer in the long history of restriction of movement for black Americans and the creation of safe spaces in our communities.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)Founded by Oscar and Emmy Award-winning director Roger Ross Williams and Emmy Award-winning producer Geoff Martz, One Story Up specializes in creating both socially and artistically driven documentary films, television, series, animation and VR.
Winner Sundance directing award: U.S. documentary
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