Amandla Stenberg
Amandla Stenberg (born October 23, 1998) is an American actress and singer. She[a] was included in Time's list of Most Influential Teens in both 2015 and 2016,[2][3] and has received several accolades, including a Teen Choice Award, an NAACP Image Award, and nominations for four Black Reel Awards and a Critics' Choice Award.
Amandla Stenberg
Stenberg began acting as a child in the film Colombiana (2011). She had her breakthrough playing Rue in the action film The Hunger Games (2012), and went on to play Macey Irving in the supernatural series Sleepy Hollow (2013–2014) and Halle Foster in the sitcom Mr. Robinson (2015). As an adult, her roles as Maddy Whittier in the romance film Everything, Everything (2017) and Starr Carter in the drama film The Hate U Give (2018) helped her rise to prominence. She has played Ruby in the science fiction film The Darkest Minds (2018), Alana Beck in the musical film Dear Evan Hansen (2021), Sophie in the comedy horror film Bodies Bodies Bodies (2022), and voiced Margo Kess / Spider-Byte in the animated film Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023).
Stenberg has been recognized for her outspoken views, particularly towards her activism for LGBT youth, which has received significant media coverage. She made her musical debut as part of the folk rock duo Honeywater, formed in 2015, and performed the song "Let My Baby Stay" for Everything, Everything.
Early life
Amandla Stenberg, born in Los Angeles, California, is the child of Karen Brailsford, an African-American spiritual counselor and writer, and Tom Stenberg, who is Danish.[4][5][6][7] She has Greenlandic Inuit ancestry from her paternal grandmother.[8] Stenberg has two older half-sisters on her father's side.[9][10]
Her first name means "power" or "strength" in the South African languages of IsiXhosa and Zulu.[11] At age four, Stenberg started doing catalog modeling shoots for Disney.[1] She has appeared in commercials for clients such as Boeing and Kmart.[12][13]
Career
2011–2016: Early roles and breakthrough
In 2011, she appeared in her first feature film, Colombiana, as a younger version of Zoe Saldana's character.[14] Her breakthrough came at the age of 14, when she was cast as Rue in the 2012 film The Hunger Games.[15] The film was a critical and financial success,[16][17] and Stenberg's performance was praised. She received a number of awards and nominations, including a Black Reel Award nomination.[18] In 2013, she was cast in the short film Mercy playing the daughter of Robin Thicke and Paula Patton; Thicke directed the film.[19][20] Stenberg had a recurring role on season one of Sleepy Hollow from 2013 to 2014.[21]
In 2013, Stenberg began performing on the violin and singing harmonies at Los Angeles venues with singer-songwriter Zander Hawley. In 2014, Stenberg voiced Bia in the animated film Rio 2, which was a commercial success.[22][23] In 2015, Stenberg released her first EP in August 2015 as the folk-rock duo Honeywater. In 2015, she released the video "Don't Cash Crop My Cornrows".[24] She played series regular Halle Foster on the short-lived series Mr. Robinson, which ran in 2015.[25] Stenberg co-wrote the comic book Niobe: She is Life with Sebastian Jones, which was illustrated by Ashley A. Woods, and published in November 2015.[26][27] It is the first nationally distributed comic that has a black woman as its protagonist, author, and another as the artist.[28]
In 2016, Stenberg appeared in Beyoncé: Lemonade by Beyoncé,[29] and won the BET YoungStars Award.[30] In the same year, she signed with The Society, a modelling agency.[31] Also in 2016, Stenberg had auditioned for the role of Shuri in the superhero film Black Panther, however, she walked away because she felt that she was not right for the role. She told Variety magazine in 2018: "It was so exhilarating to see it fulfilled by people who should have been a part of it and who deserved it and who were right for it. I just wasn't."[32][33] The role was instead given to actress Letitia Wright.
Awards and nominations
Stenberg's accolades include an NAACP Image Award, a Teen Choice Award, and nominations for four Black Reel Awards and a Critics' Choice Award. She has also won awards for her activism.