Danai Gurira
Danai Jekesai Gurira (/dəˈnaɪ ɡʊˈrɪərə/; born February 14, 1978) is a Zimbabwean-American actress and playwright. She is best known for her starring roles as Michonne on the AMC horror drama series The Walking Dead (2012–2020, 2022) and The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live (2024), and as Okoye in the Marvel Cinematic Universe superhero films, including Black Panther (2018) and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022).
Danai Gurira
United States and Zimbabwe
- Actress
- playwright
2004–present
Gurira is also the playwright of the Broadway play Eclipsed, for which she was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Play.[1]
Early life and education[edit]
Gurira was born on February 14, 1978, in Grinnell, Iowa, to Josephine Gurira, a college librarian, and Roger Gurira, a tenured professor in the Department of Chemistry at Grinnell College (both parents later joined the staff of University of Wisconsin–Platteville).[2][3][4] Her parents moved from Southern Rhodesia, which is now Zimbabwe, to the United States in 1964.[5] She is the youngest of four siblings; Shingai and Choni are her sisters and Tare, her brother,[3] is a chiropractor. Gurira lived in Grinnell until December 1983, when at age five she and her family moved back to Harare, the capital of Zimbabwe,[6] after Robert Mugabe rose to power in 1979.[7]
She attended high school at Dominican Convent High School. Afterward, she returned to the United States to study at Macalester College[4] in Saint Paul, Minnesota, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in psychology.[5] Gurira also earned a Master of Fine Arts in acting from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts.[8]
Career[edit]
Early career[edit]
Gurira taught playwriting and acting in Liberia, Zimbabwe and South Africa.[3] One of her earliest notable performances occurred in 2001, as a senior at Macalester College. Gurira performed in a production of the Ntozake Shange play For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf, directed and choreographed by Dale Ricardo Shields. “She was a very intelligent, strong and independent young lady,” said Shields. “She approached her studies, her classes, with a lot of focus, and you can see the same things in her performance in ‘Black Panther.’ ”[9]
Activism[edit]
In 2008, Gurira appeared at the Global Green Sustainable Design Awards to read a letter written by a New Orleans native displaced by Hurricane Katrina.[43]
In 2011, Gurira co-founded Almasi Arts, an organization dedicated to continuing arts education in Zimbabwe.[4][44][45] Gurira currently serves as the Executive Artistic Director.[46]
In 2015, Gurira signed an open letter begun by the ONE Campaign. The letter was addressed to Angela Merkel and Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, urging them to focus on women as they serve as the head of the G7 in Germany and the AU in South Africa respectively.[47] The following year, Gurira founded the non-profit organization Love Our Girls, which aims to highlight the issues and challenges that specifically affect women throughout the world.[48][49] In 2016, Gurira partnered with Johnson & Johnson in the fight against HIV/AIDS.[50]
On December 2, 2018, Gurira was announced as a UN Women Goodwill Ambassador by UN Women Executive Director Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka at the Global Citizen Festival in Johannesburg, South Africa. As a UN Women Goodwill Ambassador, Gurira dedicates her support to putting a spotlight on gender equality and women's rights, as well as bringing unheard women's voices front and center.[51]