Danai Gurira

“Actors may not realize the extent of their own power. Acting is creation. It's them bringing their own stuff, letting it marinate in their soul, in their creative engine.” Zimbabwean actress and playwright, although she is best known for her roles in The Walking Dead (2010-2022) and the Black Panther films of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, she is an award-winning playwright with works including In the Continuum (2005), Eclipsed (2009), The Convert (2011), and Familiar (2015). During her rise as a playwright, Gurira played several supporting roles on television shows including Law and Order and Life on Mars. Her early films include the drama The Visitor (2007), the horror film My Soul to Take (2010), and the drama Restless City (2011). By 2012 she joined the cast of the popular series The Walking Dead interpreting Michonne, a character that brought her to stardom that she left in 2020, but not for long since in 2022 it was confirmed that she would return to retake it for the spin-off of the series. In the meantime, Gurira continued acting in films. She starred in the drama Mother of George (2013) and a biopic of rapper Tupac Shakur titled All Eyez on Me (2017). In 2018, she joined the cast of the movie based on the Marvel comic Black Panther, being one of the few big-budget films composed mostly of actors of color, being praised by audiences and critics alike. Co-founder of Almasi Collaborative Arts, a community that helps educate and train drama students in Zimbabwe. She is also the founder of Love Our Girls (LOG), an organization dedicated to raising awareness of the injustices faced by women and girls around the world.