Mara Brock Akil facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Mara Brock Akil
Mara Brock Akil at Essence Festival 2025
Born	Mara Brock (1970-05-27) May 27, 1970 (age 55) Compton, California, U.S.
Alma mater	Northwestern University
Occupation	Screenwriter, producer
Years active	1993–present
Spouse(s)	Salim Akil ​ (m. 1999)​
Children	2 Yasin Ali Akil Nasir Lukmon Akil

Mara Brock Akil (born May 27, 1970) is an American television writer and producer. She creates and produces popular TV shows. She started her writing career at age 23 on the show South Central in 1994.

When she was 30, Mara Brock Akil became the youngest African American person to lead a TV show, called a showrunner. She created the sitcom Girlfriends, which aired from 2000 to 2008. She was also the first African American female showrunner to have two shows on TV at the same time. This happened when she created The Game, a spin-off of Girlfriends, which aired from 2006 to 2015.

She also created Being Mary Jane (2013–2019), which was the first drama series for the BET network. She also created a new version of The Game (2021–2022) for Paramount+. With her husband, Salim Akil, she co-created the romantic drama Love Is (2018) and helped produce the superhero series Black Lightning (2018–2021).

Mara Brock Akil and her husband started their company, Akil Productions, in 2000. In 2021, she started Story27 with Netflix. Through this company, she is creating her sixth TV series, a romantic teen drama called Forever, which is set to air in 2025. She also worked as a writer and producer on other shows like Moesha (1996–1999) and The Jamie Foxx Show (1999–2000). She also worked on the movie Sparkle (2012).

Mara Brock Akil is the only African American showrunner to have a TV series airing every year of the 2000s. Her shows were among the few with mostly Black actors on broadcast TV during that time.

Early Life and School

Mara Brock was born in 1970 in Compton, California. Her parents were Joan Carol Fullmore and William Bartido Brock II. She has an older brother, William "Bill" Brock III, and a younger sister, Kara Brock.

When Mara was eight, her parents divorced. Her mother moved with the children to the Kansas City metropolitan area in Missouri. Her mother worked hard to become a computer programmer while raising Mara and her siblings.

When Mara was 11, she saw a 17-year-old Whitney Houston on the cover of Seventeen magazine. This made Mara feel hopeful that "things are possible." She graduated from Raytown South High School in 1988. There, she decided she wanted to be a writer.

She chose to apply to only one college, Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. She hoped to study at the Medill School of Journalism. She was accepted and joined the Delta Sigma Theta sorority.

In her first year of college, Mara helped friends in a Black sketch comedy group. She wrote a funny skit about famous boxer Mike Tyson and his wife. She said, "The first laugh was a high I will never forget." She took classes that focused on directing and performing African-American literature. She also acted in two plays.

Mara had an internship at a newspaper in Michigan. This experience changed how she thought about telling stories. She realized that her own stories might not be seen as important in journalism. So, in her last year of college, she decided to "tell the truth through fiction."

She graduated in 1992. She then worked as an assistant manager at a Gap clothing store for a year. After that, she decided to move to Los Angeles to pursue her dream of working in television.

Career in Television

Starting Out (1993–2000)

In 1993, Mara had a small acting part in the movie With Honors. After moving to Los Angeles, she got a job as a production assistant on The Sinbad Show, a sitcom that aired for one season.

In 1994, while working on The Sinbad Show, she wanted to become a writer. She bravely told the executive producer, "Let me spend it on why you need me." This led to her becoming a writer's trainee on the show South Central. This show was about a single mom and her three kids.

After a break, she started working on Moesha, a very popular sitcom starring Brandy Norwood. It aired for six seasons! Mara was a writer for the first four seasons and a producer for the fourth season. She learned a lot about how to not just write, but also how to produce a show. Next, she worked on The Jamie Foxx Show as a supervising producer and writer.

Creating Her Own Shows (2000–2009)

In May 2000, Mara Brock Akil created Girlfriends. She sold her idea for the show to UPN just before her 30th birthday. The show premiered on September 11, 2000. Girlfriends was about the life of Joan Clayton, played by Tracee Ellis Ross, and her three friends. The show ran for eight seasons, ending in 2008.

She also created and produced a spin-off show from Girlfriends called The Game. She worked on this show with her husband, Salim Akil. The Game followed Joan's cousin, Melanie Barnett, played by Tia Mowry. Melanie puts her dreams of being a doctor on hold to support her boyfriend, a professional football player. The show aired on The CW network for three seasons until 2009.

After being canceled for about two years, The Game was picked up by BET. When it returned in 2011, its Season 4 premiere brought in 7.7 million viewers. The show continued for six more seasons on BET. In 2009, Brock Akil also worked as a consulting producer and writer for the ABC sitcom Cougar Town.

New Projects and Partnerships (2009–Present)

Mara Brock Akil created Being Mary Jane for BET, which premiered in 2013. This was her and her husband's first hour-long drama series. The show starred Gabrielle Union as Mary Jane Paul, a successful news anchor.

In 2015, she signed a deal with Warner Bros. Television. In 2017, she joined a new talent agency, Creative Artists Agency (CAA).

The Akils also created and produced a superhero series called Black Lightning. This show was based on DC Comics characters and premiered in 2018.

In 2020, Mara Brock Akil announced a deal with Netflix to create new content. In 2021, she launched her new production company, Story27, under her Netflix deal. She announced that three new series and one documentary were being developed.

Personal Life

Mara Brock Akil is a fan of the Kansas City Chiefs football team. She and her friends Gina Prince-Bythewood, Sara Finney-Johnson, and Felicia D. Henderson started a scholarship called The Four Sisters Scholarship in 2005.

She is married to Salim Akil, who is also a producer, director, and screenwriter. They met in 1997 and started dating before getting married in April 1999. They have two sons: Yasin Ali Akil (born 2004) and Nasir Lukmon Akil (born 2009).

Mara Brock Akil and her husband are Sufi Muslims. Mara was born into a Muslim family. After her parents divorced, her mother and the children practiced Christianity for a while. Mara later returned to Islam before or during her relationship with Salim Akil.

Film and TV Work

Movies

Year	Title	Producer	Writer	Notes
1994	With Honors			Actress
2012	Sparkle	Yes	Yes
2015	The Start Up	Yes		Television film
2023	Stamped from the Beginning	Yes		Documentary

Television Shows

Year	Title	Creator	Producer	Writer	Director	Notes
1993–1994	The Sinbad Show					Production assistant Also actress: "Keep the Faith"
1994	South Central			Yes
1995	Dave's World					Production assistant
1996–1999	Moesha		Yes	Yes		Producer: 22 episodes Writer: 9 episodes Also story editor: 9 episodes
1999–2000	The Jamie Foxx Show		Yes	Yes		Supervising producer: 24 episodes Executive producer: 1 episode Writer: 4 episodes
2000–2008	Girlfriends	Yes	Yes	Yes		Also actress: "The Game"
2006–2009, 2011–2015	The Game	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Director: "Dust in the Wind"
2009	Leading Women					Documentary Self: Episode 2
2010	Cougar Town		Yes	Yes		Consulting producer: 22 episodes Writer: 2 episodes
2013–2015, 2017, 2019	Being Mary Jane	Yes	Yes	Yes
2015	Reed Between the Lines		Yes			Executive producer: 3 episodes
2018	Love Is	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Director: 2 episodes
2018–2021	Black Lightning		Yes			Executive producer
2020	Make It Work!					Television special; Self
2021	On Story					Season 12, episode 9
	History of the Sitcom					Documentary Self: 3 episodes
2021–2023	The Game	Yes	Yes
2023	See It Loud: The History of Black Television					Documentary Self: 3 episodes
2025–present	Forever	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Executive producer Writer: 2 episodes Director: "The Vineyard"

Awards and Nominations

Mara Brock Akil has received many awards and nominations for her work in television and film. These awards recognize her talent as a writer, producer, and creator of popular shows.