US (2019) Director & Cast
Jordan Peele, Lupita Nyong'o, Elisabeth Moss, and Winston Duke
JORDAN PEELE (Written, Produced and Directed by), LUPITA NYONG'O (Adelaide Wilson/Red), ELISABETH MOSS (Kitty Tyler), WINSTON DUKE (Gabe Wilson/Abraham)
Oscar and Emmy winner JORDAN PEELE (Written, Produced and Directed by) wrote, produced and directed the critically acclaimed blockbuster Get Out, which was recognized with four Academy Award nominations. It was nominated for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor and earned Peele the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. Peele became only the fifth African-American to be nominated for Best Director and the first to ever win the Oscar for original screenplay. Despite a budget of $4.5 million, the film grossed more than $250 million worldwide.
Prior to Get Out, Peele was the co-star and co-creator of Key and Peele on Comedy Central. The sketch comedy show-which unabashedly lampooned pop culture and social issues in America, particularly race relations-received critical praise and would go on to garner more than 1 billion online hits. The hit show won a Peabody Award, an American Comedy Award and received 12 Emmy Award nominations, earning Peele an Emmy for Outstanding Variety Sketch Series.
In 2016, Peele and his co-star Keegan Michael-Key would team up in the feature film Keanu, an action-comedy centering around an adorable kitten, which Peele also co-wrote. From 2003 to 2008, Peele was a cast member of Fox's MADtv for five seasons, where he was nominated for an Emmy for writing the lyrics to the musical parody video, "Sad Fitty Cent."
Peele formed his company Monkeypaw Productions to champion unique perspectives and artistic collaborations with traditionally underrepresented voices, while pushing the boundaries of conventional storytelling through genre. Monkeypaw is currently developing numerous television shows and films. Under the Monkeypaw banner, Peele produced Spike Lee's feature film BlacKkKlansman, in 2018. The film received widespread critical acclaim and earned six Academy Award nominations, including one for Best Picture, which would secure Peele his fourth Oscar nomination in two years.
In 2018, Monkeypaw produced the Tracy Morgan series, The Last O.G., at TBS. The show has been renewed for season 2, set to air in 2019. Monkeypaw has developed and is producing Lovecraft Country for HBO in partnership with Bad Robot and Misha Green. Set in the Jim Crow South, this straight-to-series pickup is an anthological sci-fi thriller, which reclaims genre storytelling from the African-American perspective. Monkeypaw is also producing a reboot of the cult classic The Twilight Zone for CBS All-Access. In addition to being a co-creator of the show, which will debut in April 2019, Peele will portray the role of the narrator that was originally played by Twilight Zone creator Rod Serling. In February, the Monkeypaw-produced docuseries Lorena, an expose of the real story behind the infamous Lorena and John Wayne Bobbitt domestic violence case, was released on Amazon. Peele and Monkeypaw are also producing a "spiritual sequel" to Candyman, Bernard Rose's 1992 horror classic. The film, which MGM Pictures will release in 2020, will be based on a screenplay co-written by Peele.
Peele was born on February 21, 1979, in New York City, where he was raised in the Upper West Side neighborhood of Manhattan. He attended Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, N.Y., as part of the class of 2001, before moving to Chicago to pursue a career in comedy. There, he studied improv and performed at the ImprovOlympic Theater and The Second City, among others. He would later move to the Netherlands to join the ensemble at Boom Chicago in Amsterdam.
Peele resides in Los Angeles with his wife, comedian Chelsea Peretti. The couple have one child.
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LUPITA NYONG'O (Adelaide Wilson/Red) made her feature debut in Steve McQueen's Academy Award-winning film, 12 Years a Slave, alongside Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender and Brad Pitt. For her portrayal as Patsey, Nyong'o received the Academy Award in the category of Best Supporting Actress as well as multiple accolades including the Screen Actors Guild Award, the Critics' Choice Award, the Independent Spirit Award, NAACP Award and the 2013 Hollywood Film Awards New Hollywood Award.
Nyong'o most recently starred as Nakia in Marvel's Oscar-nominated film, Black Panther, which has broken numerous box-office records since it was released in February 2018. Ryan Coogler directed the film, which co-starred Chadwick Boseman, Michael B. Jordan, Daniel Kaluuya, Letitia Wright and Danai Gurira. The cast won the SAG Award for Best Ensemble and Nyong'o's performance earned her a nomination for an NAACP Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture.
Upcoming, Nyong'o stars as Miss Caroline in the Australian zombie comedy-horror crossover Little Monsters opposite Josh Gad and Alexander England. Abe Forsythe writes and directs the film, which premiered at Sundance in January 2019 and will be released later this year by Hulu and NEON.
Nyong'o will appear in the feature film Born a Crime, the biopic based on Trevor Noah's New York Times best-selling book of the same name. Nyong'o will play Patricia Noah, Trevor's mother. The film will be produced by Noah through his Angel Ark Productions, along with Mainstay Entertainment's Norman Aladjem, Derek Van Pelt, Sanaz Yamin and Nyong'o.
Along with Jessica Chastain, Marion Cotillard, Penélope Cruz and Fan Bingbing, Nyong'o is set to star in 355, a female-driven spy-thriller produced by Chastain's production company, Freckle Films. The film is a secret-agent drama, which promises a globe-trotting adventure, with the five women playing spies from international agencies who come together and overcome suspicions and conflicts as they battle to stop a global organization from thrusting the world into chaos. Universal purchased the film out of Cannes.
Nyong'o will also star opposite Viola Davis in TriStar Pictures' The Woman King. Inspired by true events that took place in the Kingdom of Dahomey, one of the most powerful states of Africa in the 18th and 19th centuries, the film tells the story of Nanisca (Davis), general of the all-female military unit known as the Amazons, and her daughter Nawi (Nyong'o), who together fought the French and neighboring tribes who violated their honor and enslaved their people.
Nyong'o is set to produce and star in the on-screen adaptation of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's best-selling novel Americanah, the sweeping love story that spans three continents of Ifemelu and Obinze, two Nigerians who face the complexities of race and identity away from home and each other. Danai Gurira is set to write the miniseries.
In 2016, Nyong'o starred in Mira Nair's Queen of Katwe, opposite David Oyelowo and Madina Nalwanga. Based on the best-selling book of the same name, the Disney film is an inspirational true story about Phiona Mutesi who overcomes abject poverty to become an international chess master. Her portrayal of Phiona's fierce yet tender mother, Harriet, earned her a nomination for an NAACP Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture.
Also in 2016, Nyong'o lent her voice to Jon Favreau's, The Jungle Book as Raksha, with Scarlett Johansson, Idris Elba, Bill Murray, Sir Ben Kingsley and Christopher Walken.
Nyong'o earned a Tony nomination for her 2016 Broadway debut in Danai Gurira's play, Eclipsed. It tells the story of five extraordinary women brought together by the upheaval of war in their homeland, Liberia. Prior to moving to Broadway, the play had a limited run at New York's The Public Theater. Eclipsed was nominated for a further four Tony Awards, including Best Play, and won in the category of Best Costume Design.
In December 2015, Nyong'o starred in J.J. Abrams' Star Wars: The Force Awakens, alongside Harrison Ford, Daisy Ridley, John Boyega and Oscar Isaac. Nyong'o brought to life Maz Kanata, a motion-captured character. The film was released by Disney on December 18, 2015. She reprised this role in Star Wars: The Last Jedi, written and directed by Rian Johnson, which Disney released in December 2017.
Nyong'o served as the creator, director, editor and producer of the award-winning feature-length documentary In My Genes. The documentary follows eight Kenyans who have one thing in common: they were born with albinism, a genetic condition that causes a lack of pigmentation. In many parts of the world, including Kenya, it is a condition that marginalizes, stigmatizes and even endangers those who have it. Though highly visible in a society that is predominantly black, the reality of living with albinism is invisible to most. Through her intimate portraits, Nyong'o enables viewers to see the subjects' challenges, humanity and everyday triumphs.
In 2019, Simon & Schuster Books will publish Sulwe, Nyong'o's debut book. Colorism, or the preferential treatment of those with lighter skin, is an issue across the globe, and impacts children from a young age. Nyong'o herself has experienced the harmful effects of colorism and has spoken about how it hurt her self-image as a child. In Sulwe, an illustrated children's book, she candidly shares the consequences of growing up in a world that favors lighter skin, offering a healing story that will entertain children from all backgrounds while providing a story that helps them see beauty in themselves and others.
Nyong'o graduated from the Yale School of Drama's acting program where her additional stage credits included playing Perdita in The Winter's Tale (Yale Repertory Theater), Sonya in Uncle Vanya, Katherine in The Taming of the Shrew as well as being in the original production of Michael Mitnick's Elijah.
Nyong'o resides in New York.
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ELISABETH MOSS (Kitty Tyler) is currently in production on the third season of the Emmy Award-winning Hulu drama series The Handmaid's Tale, based on the acclaimed Margaret Atwood novel of the same name, on which she also serves as executive producer. Among the many honors and accolades she has received for her performance on the show are an Emmy and Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Drama Series.
On the film side, Moss can next be seen starring in Us, Jordan Peele's highly anticipated second feature film, also starring Lupita Nyong'o and Winston Duke, followed by Her Smell, on which she also serves as producer and reunites her with writer/director Alex Ross Perry for the third time. This fall she will star in The Kitchen, an adaptation of the DC/Vertigo crime comic-book series of the same name, in which she stars opposite Melissa McCarthy and Tiffany Haddish for writer/director Andrea Berloff.
Moss recently completed production on Shirley, which she also produced, starring opposite Michael Stuhlbarg. Directed by Josephine Decker, the film tells the story of a young couple that moves in with the famed author Shirley Jackson in the hopes of starting a new life but instead find themselves fodder for a psycho-drama that inspires Jackson's next major novel. She is also set to star in and produce the film Call Jane, a true story set in 1960s Chicago about an underground network of suburban women who secretly provided safe abortions before the landmark decision Roe v. Wade.
Her additional film credits include The Old Man & the Gun with Robert Redford and Casey Affleck; The Seagull, based on the classic Chekov play, directed by Michael Mayer and which starred Annette Bening and Saoirse Ronan; the Academy Award-nominated foreign film The Square, from Danish director Ruben Ostlund, which also won the Palme d'Or at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival; Mad to Be Normal starring David Tennant; the short film Tokyo Project, directed by Richard Shepard and starred opposite Ebon Moss-Bachrach; Chuck with Liev Schreiber; High-Rise, a film directed by Ben Wheatley, which starred Tom Hiddleston, Sienna Miller and Jeremy Irons; Truth, with Cate Blanchett and Robert Redford; Queen of Earth, written and directed by Perry; The One I Love, in which she starred with Mark Duplass; Listen Up Philip, directed by Perry and which starred Jason Schwartzman; Walter Salles' adaptation of the classic Jack Kerouac novel "On the Road"; Get Him to the Greek; The Missing; Girl, Interrupted; and Virgin, for which she was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Actress.
On television, Moss is developing the limited series Fever, in which she will star and executive produce, based on the Mary Beth Keane novel which tells the story of the first known healthy carrier of typhoid fever who became known as "Typhoid Mary" as she spread typhoid across the burgeoning metropolis of early twentieth century New York.
Moss's additional television credits include Jane Campion's highly acclaimed miniseries Top of the Lake-for which she received both a Golden Globe Award and a Critics' Choice TV Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Movie or Miniseries, as well as Emmy and SAG Award nominations in the same category-and its follow-up Top of the Lake: China Girl; the award-winning series Mad Men, for which her performance as Peggy Olson earned her six Emmy Award nominations, a Golden Globe Award nomination, and two Screen Actors Guild Awards; and Aaron Sorkin's critically praised and award-winning drama, The West Wing, on which she played Zoey Bartlet, daughter to Martin Sheen's president.
Moss starred on Broadway in The Heidi Chronicles, a Broadway revival of Wendy Wasserstein's Pulitzer- and Tony Award-winning play, for which Moss' performance as the title character earned her a Tony nomination, Drama League and Outer Critics Circle Award nominations. Moss' additional theater credits include The Children's Hour in London's West End opposite Keira Knightley, the Broadway revival of David Mamet's Speed-the-Plow opposite William H. Macy and her New York theater debut at the Atlantic Theater Company in Franny's Way.
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WINSTON DUKE (Gabe Wilson/Abraham) made his feature film debut in Black Panther, the highest-grossing film of 2018, as well as the third-highest-grossing film ever, in the United States. Duke played the fan-favorite character M'Baku, leader of the Jabari Tribe and eventual valuable ally to King T'Challa.
Later in the year, Duke reprised his role as M'Baku in Avenger's: Infinity War. Duke's upcoming projects include a starring role in Jordan Peele's highly anticipated next film, Us to be released on March 22, 2019.
Other projects include the Netflix crime drama Wonderland, in which he co-stars with Academy Award nominee Mark Wahlberg and Paramount Pictures' action-thriller Heroine.
Duke has already received numerous accolades, including the Breakout Award at the 2018 Savannah Film Festival, and he was highlighted as one of the top ten actors in The Hollywood Reporter's "Next Generation" issue.
Outside of acting, Duke is an advocate for the HeForShe movement and most recently issued a global call to action for gender equality during the United Nations HeForShe Impact Summit. He also has joined the American Diabetes Association to spark a national conversation about diabetes-a disease that impacts nearly half of the U.S. adult population.
A native of Trinidad and Tobago, Duke received his bachelor of arts in theatre at the University at Buffalo and master of fine arts at the Yale School of Drama.
