Discipline: Film/Video – screenplay

Shaka King

Discipline: Film/Video – screenplay
Region: Brooklyn, NY
MacDowell Fellowships: 2016

Shaka King is a filmmaker who was at work on a feature length screenplay satirizing magical Negro movies and celebrity-reality television during his residency. His film Mulignans played at more than a dozen film festivals including the 2015 Sundance Film Festival.

In 2021, Shaka’s Judas and the Black Messiah earned six Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay. If the film wins for Best Picture, it will be the first time an all-Black producing team wins in the category.

Studios

Mixter

Shaka King worked in the Mixter studio.

Built in 1927–1930, the Florence Kilpatrick Mixter Studio was funded by its namesake and designed by the architect F. Winsor, Jr., who also designed MacDowell's original Savidge Library in 1925. Mixter Studio, solidly built of yellow and grey-hued granite, once had sweeping views of Pack Monadnock to the east. The lush forest has now grown…

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