Darnell Martin

With a sharp creative vision and an uncompromising set of ideals, filmmaker Darnell Martin first made a name for herself with her 1994 feature film debut "I Like it Like That" (1994). Born in the Bronx in 1964 to a white mother and a black father, Martin professed to feeling more at home with the Puerto Rican family that lived next door to her than with members of her parents' respective races-amongst whom she never felt she fit in. She would graduate from Sarah Lawrence college before gaining an apprenticeship as an assistant camera operator on Spike Lee's "Do the Right Thing" (1989). Martin soon began directing commercials and music videos for artists like Samantha Fox and Chi Ali before directing her first short film, "Suspect" (1992). The piece explored the way people of color are all too often unfairly perceived as criminals, and it won major acclaim at New York Public Theater's Young Black Cinema showcase. She followed it with "I Like it Like That," before switching gears to focus on TV, directing several episodes of shows like "ER" (NBC, 1994-2009) and "Oz" (HBO, 1997-2003). Martin returned to the big screen in 2001, writing and directing the drama "Prison Song" (2001). She next made waves in 2005, directing the acclaimed TV movie adaptation of Zora Neale Hurston's "Their Eyes Were Watching God" (2005). Turning to the big screen again, Martin then wrote and directed the musical drama "Cadillac Records" (2008), a film chronicling the rise of blues and R&B label Chess Records from the '40s through the '60s. She would garner acclaim for directing the TV movie "Firelight" (ABC, 2012), and remained active in episodic TV, directing episodes of "Beyond" (ABC Family, 2016-), "Incorporated" (Syfy, 2016-), and "Sleepy Hollow" (Fox, 2013-) in 2017.