Danai Gurira

Gurira taught playwriting and acting in Liberia, Zimbabwe and South Africa.[2] One of her earliest notable performances occurred in 2001, as a senior at Macalester College. Gurira performed in a production of the Ntozake Shange play For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf, directed and choreographed by Dale Ricardo Shields. “She was a very intelligent, strong and independent young lady,” said Shields. “She approached her studies, her classes, with a lot of focus, and you can see the same things in her performance in ‘Black Panther.’ ”[8]

Gurira at the 2015 The Walking Dead Panel at San Diego Comic Con.

Gurira said that she began writing plays in an effort to better utilize her strengths as an actress, and to tell stories that convey ideas about strong women with whom she identifies.[4] As a playwright, she has been commissioned by Yale Repertory Theatre, Center Theatre Group, Playwrights Horizons, and the Royal Court.

Gurira co-wrote and co-starred in In the Continuum, first at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company and later Off-Broadway, which won her an Obie Award, an Outer Critics Circle Award, and a Helen Hayes Award for Best Lead Actress.[7] In December 2011, In the Continuum commemorated World AIDS Day 2011. Sponsored by the United States Embassy in Zimbabwe, the play was performed at Harare's Theatre and featured the story of two women who were navigating the world after contracting HIV.[9]

In 2009, Gurira made her acting debut on Broadway in August Wilson's play Joe Turner's Come and Gone playing Martha Pentecost.[10]

Gurira's 2012 play The Convert was premiered as a co-production between the Goodman Theatre in Chicago and the McCarter Theatre in New Jersey. Later that year, Gurira received the Whiting Award for an emerging playwright.[11]

In January 2015, Familiar, a play written by Gurira and directed by Rebecca Taichman, opened at Yale Repertory Theatre.[12] It later premiered Off-Broadway in New York at Playwrights Horizons. The play is about family, cultural identity, and the experience of life as a first-generation American, and Gurira has said that it was inspired in part by her family and friends.[13]

In 2015, Lupita Nyong'o starred in Gurira's play, Eclipsed (2009), Off-Broadway at The Public Theater.[14] It was announced that the play would move to Broadway in 2016 at the John Golden Theatre.[15][16][17] It was the first play to premiere on Broadway with an all female and black cast and creative team. The play is set in war-torn Liberia and focuses on three women who are living as sex slaves to a rebel commander, as well as one of his former wives, and a relief worker, and follows and how they deal with this difficult situation.[18] It starred Lupita Nyong'o, Akosua Busia, Saycon Sengbloh, Zainab Jah, and Pascale Armand and was directed by Liesl Tommy.[19] The inspiration for Gurira's play was a photo of Colonel Black Diamond, a female freedom fighter from Liberia, in an article in The New York Times. "Just to see these women standing there, you know, in their jeans and ... fashionable tops and their hair is all done, and they're all carrying AK-47s, was just an image I couldn't get out of my head." The image prompted curiosity about Liberia's fourteen-year civil wars, as well as a research trip to Liberia in 2007. Gurira interviewed more than 30 women who had been raped, among whose daughters that had been taken by rebel fighters and turned into sex slaves. She also spoke to female peace activists who were instrumental in ending the violence. The names of the women in Eclipsed come from the people Gurira met during her travels, whereas the fifth character is unnamed.[20]

She received the 2016 Sam Norkin Award, for Eclipsed and Familiar, presented by the Drama Desk Awards, which said, in part: "Danai Gurira demonstrates great insight, range and depth, bringing a fresh new voice to American theater."[21] Eclipsed was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Play, and won the Tony Award for Best Costume Design in a Play.[22]

Gurira starred in the drama film The Visitor in 2007, for which she won Method Fest Independent Film Festival Award for Best Supporting Actress. She appeared in the 2008 film Ghost Town, the 2010 films 3 Backyards and My Soul to Take, and Restless City in 2011, as well as the television series Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Life on Mars, and Law & Order. From 2010 to 2011, she appeared in the HBO drama series Treme.

In March 2012, AMC announced on a live broadcast that Gurira would join the cast of their horror-drama series The Walking Dead, the highest rated series in cable television history,[23] in its third season.[24][25][26] Gurira plays Michonne, a relentless, katana-wielding character who joins a close-knit group in an apocalyptic world.[25][27] Gurira had to learn how to ride horses for the series, which she enjoyed because it was a physical challenge.[28] In February 2019, reports emerged that Gurira would be exiting the show once she had filmed her last episodes during the tenth season.[29] Gurira's final episode, "What We Become" aired in March 2020, and by the time of her departure, she had been second billed in the opening credits.

In 2013, Gurira played a lead role in director Andrew Dosunmu's independent drama film Mother of George, which premiered at 2013 Sundance Film Festival.[4] Gurira received critical acclaim for her performance as a Nigerian woman struggling to live in the United States.[30][31] In June 2013, Gurira won the Jean-Claude Gahd Dam award at the 2013 Guys Choice Awards.[32]

Gurira played rapper Tupac Shakur's mother, Afeni Shakur, in All Eyez on Me, a 2017 biopic about the rap star.[33] She then starred in Marvel's film Black Panther, which was released in February 2018. She played Okoye, the head of the Dora Milaje, the personal bodyguards of the Black Panther, and received critical acclaim for her performance.[34] Gurira reprised Okoye in both Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame, released in 2018 and 2019 respectively. In 2020, she signed a deal with ABC Studios.[35]