Ava DuVernay (born August 24) is an American filmmaker, marketer and film distributor. At the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, DuVernay became the first African American woman to win the Best Director Prize for her second feature film Middle of Nowhere.

DuVernay formed The DuVernay Agency, later known as DVA Media + Marketing, in 1999. The award-winning marketing and publicity firm has provided strategy and execution for more than 100 film and television projects by directors such as Steven Spielberg, Clint Eastwood, Michael Mann, Robert Rodriguez, Kevin Smith, Bill Condon, Raoul Peck and Gurinder Chadha.

In 2008, DuVernay made her feature directorial debut with the documentary, This Is the Life. In 2010, she directed several network music documentaries, including "My Mic Sounds Nice" for BET Networks and the Essence Music Festival 2010 for TV One.

In 2011, DuVernay's first narrative feature film, I Will Follow, a drama starring Salli Richardson-Whitfield, was released theatrically. Roger Ebert championed the film, stating, "'I Will Follow' is one of the best films I've seen about coming to terms with the death of loved one."

Tavis Smiley (pronounced /ˈtævɨs/; born September 13, 1964) is a talk show host, author, liberal political commentator, entrepreneur, advocate and philanthropist. Smiley was born in Gulfport, Mississippi, and grew up in Kokomo, Indiana. After attending Indiana University, he worked during the late 1980s as an aide to Tom Bradley, the mayor of Los Angeles. Smiley became a radio commentator in 1991, and starting in 1996, he hosted the talk show BET Talk (later renamed BET Tonight) on BET. Controversially, after Smiley sold an exclusive interview of Sara Jane Olson to ABC News in 2001, BET declined to renew Smiley's contract that year. Smiley then began hosting The Tavis Smiley Show on NPR from 2002 to 2004 and currently hosts Tavis Smiley on PBS on the weekdays and "The Tavis Smiley Show" from PRI. In 2010 Smiley and Dr. Cornel West have joined forces for their own radio talk show, Smiley & West. They were featured together interviewing musician Bill Withers in the 2009 documentary film Still Bill.

Follow-on is a term used in the sport of cricket to describe a situation where the team that bats second is forced to take its second batting innings immediately after its first, because the team was not able to get close enough (within 200 runs for a five-day match) to the score achieved by the first team batting in the first innings. It is applicable only in the longer (more traditional) two-innings-each match.

If the second team to bat scores substantially fewer runs than the first team, the first team can enforce (at their captain's discretion) the follow-on, instructing the second team to bat again immediately. In this case the sequence of batting innings will be first team, second team, second team and then (if needed) first team, so the second team is said to be "following on". This is in contrast to the normal progression of batting innings which is first team, second team, first team, second team.

This rules governing the circumstances in which follow-on may be enforced are found in Law 13 of the Laws of cricket.

David Oyelowo (born 1 April 1976) is an English actor.

Oyelowo was born in Oxford, England of Nigerian descent. He is married to actress Jessica Oyelowo and they have three sons and a daughter.

Oyelowo first attended a youth theatre after being invited by a girl to whom he was attracted. He then studied theatre studies for A level and his teacher suggested he should become an actor. After A levels Oyelowo enrolled for a year on an art foundation course before being funded through training at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA) by Nicholas Hytner. Having been offered television work Oyelowo left LAMDA before completing the course.

He had begun his stage career in 1999 when he was offered a season with the Royal Shakespeare Company playing roles in Ben Jonson's Volpone, as the title character in Oroonoko (which he also performed in the BBC radio adaptation) and Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra (1999) alongside Guy Henry, Frances de la Tour and Alan Bates. His next theatrical role is his best known one – his performance as King Henry VI in the Royal Shakespeare Company's 2001 productions of Shakespeare's trilogy of plays about the king as a part of its season This England: The Histories. In a major landmark for colour-blind casting, Oyelowo was the first black actor to play an English king in a major production of Shakespeare, and although this casting choice was initially criticised by some in the media, Oyelowo's performance was critically acclaimed and later won the 2001 Ian Charleson Award for best performance by an actor under 30 in a classical play. (A few years later, in comparison, Adrian Lester's casting as Henry V drew little comment.) Oyelowo said of this experience:

Omari Lateef Hardwick (born January 9, 1974) is an American actor, known for his roles in the TV series Saved and Dark Blue, and in the movies Spike Lee's Miracle at St. Anna (2008), The A-Team (2010), Kick-Ass (2010) and Tyler Perry's For Colored Girls (2010).

In 2003 and 2004, he participated award-winningly in the National Poetry Slam; and he's also played football.

In 2011, Hardwick received his best films reviews to date for his role as "Troy" in the critically acclaimed indie hit I Will Follow (film) (2011). Hardwick has guest starred on an episode of NBC's Chase as Chris Novak, a hard luck criminal facing prison. In 2010, Hardwick was featured in the urban lifestyle publication, Prominence Magazine for its Holiday issue.[4]

Black Reel Awards