Spike Lee

March 20, 1957 is the birth date for Shelton Jackson Lee aka Spike Lee. He is a film director, writer, actor and producer. His production company is titled 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks and has been responsible for over 35 films since 1983. Lee examines race relations, colorism, the role of media plus urban crime and poverty. He is active in political issues and has won an Emmy Award and Academy Award nominations.
Lee made his first film Last Hustle in Brooklyn at Morehouse College. He took courses at Clark Atlanta University and graduated with a degree in mass communication. He worked at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts where he earned a Master's Degree in Fine Arts.
Lee's first feature film was She's Gotta Have It in 1985 and in 1989 he made the film Do the Right Thing that was nominated for an Academy Award. His 1990 release of Mo' Better Blues found Lee on the wrong side of anti-Semitism. In 1997 he made a documentary 4 Little Girls about the children killed in the Baptist Church bombing in Alabama in 1963. This firm was nominated for the Best Feature Documentary Academy Award. Lee won the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 2013. It was worth $300,000.
Lee has directed commercials for Converse, Taco Bell, Ben & Jerry's and Jaguar plus Nike. He also directed Denzel Washington in Malcolm X in 1992, He Got Game in 1998, and Inside Man in 2006. He also made life history movies: When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts in 2006 and its follow up If God Is Willing and da Creek Don't Rise in 2010.
Le is married to Tonya Lewis and they have two children. He frequently casts himself in his films and works with Samuel L. Jackson and Delroy Lindo. He has also written Giant Steps to Change the World, and Please Puppy, Please, More. Watch for his comedy, romance and thriller movie The Sweet Blood of Jesus in 2014.