Dee Rees facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Dee Rees
Rees in 2012
Born	Diandrea Rees (1977-02-07) February 7, 1977 (age 48) Nashville, Tennessee, U.S.
Alma mater	New York University Florida A&M University
Occupation	Film director film producer screenwriter
Years active	2005–present
Spouse(s)	Sarah M. Broom

Diandrea Rees (born February 7, 1977) is an American screenwriter and director. She is known for her movies like Pariah (2011), Bessie (2015), and Mudbound (2017). Dee Rees has also written and directed episodes for TV shows such as Empire and Philip K. Dick's Electric Dreams.

Rees made history as the first African-American woman to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for her work on Mudbound. She has also received nominations for Primetime Emmy Awards and won a Directors Guild of America Award for her directing on Bessie. In 2011, she received a special award called a United States Artists Fellowship.

Early Life and Education

Dee Rees was born in 1977 in Nashville, Tennessee. Her father was a police officer, and her mother was a scientist. She went to local schools and then to Florida A&M University for college. After finishing business school, Rees worked many different jobs. She sold panty-liners, wart remover, and bunion pads. She also worked in marketing.

While working for Dr. Scholl's, Rees was on the set of a commercial. This experience made her realize she loved creating films. So, she decided to go to film school. She attended New York University's Tisch School of the Arts for her graduate studies. At NYU, famous director Spike Lee was her professor and mentor. Dee Rees later worked with Spike Lee on his films Inside Man (2006) and When the Levees Broke (2006). During this time, she started writing the script for what would become her movie Pariah. For her school project, she directed a short film based on the first part of this script. This short film, also called Pariah, was shown at 40 film festivals worldwide in 2007. It won many awards, including the Audience Award at the Los Angeles Film Festival.

Filmmaking Career

Rees's first full-length film was a documentary called Eventual Salvation (2009). It was shown on the Sundance Channel. The film tells the story of her 80-year-old grandmother, Amma. Amma, who was born in America, returns to Monrovia, Liberia to rebuild her home and community. She had escaped the difficult Liberian Civil War just ten years before.

Pariah (2011)

Dee Rees then made her first feature film, Pariah. She has said that parts of the film are based on her own life. Her former professor, Spike Lee, helped produce the movie. Pariah first showed at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. Critics praised the film for its honesty. Pariah explores the challenges faced by a Black family, including themes of religion and social class.

It was hard to get money to make the full-length Pariah movie, and it took about five years to finish. The story changed quite a bit from the short film to the feature film. The goal was to make it understandable for more people so it could reach a wider audience. When Pariah (2011) was released, it was one of the few films that showed the journey of a young person of color discovering their identity. In 2011 and 2012, Rees won many awards for Pariah. These included the John Cassavetes Award, the Gotham Independent Film Award for Breakthrough Director, and awards from the NAACP Image Awards and GLAAD Media Awards.

Bessie (2015)

In 2015, Rees's film Bessie premiered on HBO. It starred Queen Latifah as the famous singer Bessie Smith. The film was very popular with critics.

Bessie won four Primetime Emmy Awards, including the award for Outstanding Television Movie. Rees was nominated for Emmy Awards for her directing and writing on the film.

Mudbound (2017)

Dee Rees co-wrote Mudbound with Virgil Williams. This drama was based on a book by Hillary Jordan. Rees also directed the film, which starred actors like Carey Mulligan and Mary J. Blige. After being shown at Sundance in 2017, Mudbound was bought by Netflix for $12.5 million, which was the highest purchase at the festival that year.

Mudbound was filmed in New Orleans in 2016. The movie tells the story of two families in Mississippi in the 1940s. One family, the McAllans, is white and owns a large farm. Their neighbors, the Jacksons, are Black sharecroppers who work the land. Mudbound explores themes of racism and how people from different backgrounds lived during that time. The movie also shows how white privilege affected people's lives.

This film had many personal connections for Rees. For example, it included experiences from her grandfather's time in the army and her grandmother's dream of becoming a stenographer. Rees used her grandmother's journal, which had family photos and notes about ancestors, to help guide her in making the film.

Rees and Williams were nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for Mudbound. This made Rees the first African-American woman ever nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay. She was also the first African-American woman to be nominated for a writing Oscar since Suzanne de Passe in 1972. When Mary J. Blige was nominated for an Academy Award for her role in Mudbound, Rees became the first African-American woman to direct a film for which an actor received an Oscar nomination.

Other Projects

Rees also directed an episode of the show Philip K. Dick's Electric Dreams, which is available on Amazon Prime. She used this project to explore different emotions in a science fiction setting.

Rees is also set to write and direct a film called An Uncivil War. In 2018, she was nominated for NAACP Image Awards for her directing and writing.

She directed The Last Thing He Wanted, based on a book by Joan Didion. This film starred Anne Hathaway and Willem Dafoe and was released by Netflix.

Rees directed several episodes of the Apple TV+ war miniseries Masters of the Air.

Currently, Rees is set to write and direct a movie adaptation of George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess for MGM. She will work with producers Irwin Winkler and Charles Winkler.

In 2019, Rees began working on her upcoming film, The Kyd's Exquisite Follies. This is an original musical fantasy about a young musician who wants to become famous. Rees is working with producer Cassian Elwes, and singer-songwriter Santigold will create the music.

In June 2021, Dee Rees was announced as the first African-American woman to direct a Criterion film. Her movie Pariah (2011) was added to the collection. Criterion has recognized the need to include more female directors and directors of color.

Filmmaking Style

Influences

Rees has shared that she was inspired by the realistic directing style of John Cassavetes. She also liked the natural camera work of Bradford Young on the TV show Friday Night Lights.

Method and Themes

Dee Rees often uses her own life experiences as inspiration for her films. For example, her first major film, Pariah (2011), draws from her life. She also uses her experiences for the main character in her newest project, The Kyd's Exquisite Follies. As a Black filmmaker, Rees's unique background is a big part of who she is in Hollywood. She believes that her different perspective helps her share her experiences through her films.

Rees's identity as a Black woman is also very important in her films. Black women are central characters in many of her movies, such as Pariah (2011), Mudbound (2017), and Bessie (2015), as well as some of her upcoming projects.

Even though she is still early in her career, Rees has shown many different styles in her films as she explores her identity as a filmmaker. She is known for spending many hours on shots that might only last a few seconds, paying close attention to visual details.

Collaborators

Spike Lee was Dee Rees's mentor when she was at NYU Tisch. They worked together on films like Inside Man (2006) and When the Levees Broke (2006). Lee also helped produce Rees's breakthrough film, Pariah (2011).

Cassian Elwes, who produced Mudbound (2017), has worked with Rees on several projects. These include The Last Thing He Wanted (2020) and Rees's upcoming film, The Kyd's Exquisite Follies.

Lisa Cortés directed and produced the 2023 documentary film Little Richard: I am Everything, with Rees serving as an executive producer.

Personal Life

Dee Rees is married to poet and writer Sarah M. Broom. They live in Harlem.

Rees, who is of African American descent, often includes her family's history in her films. For example, her 2017 film Mudbound uses her own grandmother's experiences to show how American violence and racism affected people's lives and identities.

Filmography

Short film

Feature film

Television

Awards and Nominations

See also

In Spanish: Dee Rees para niños

• List of female film and television directors