Queen Latifah’s Queen Collective Is Supporting Black Women Filmmakers Through Mentorship And Distribution Opportunities

The Oscar-nominated actress continues to open doors for the next generation of Black creatives with the Queen Collective.

It’s Women’s History Month, and Queen Latifah deserves her flowers for the opportunities she continue to create for other women. This year, Latifah is rolling her sleeves up and using the Queen Collective to spotlight more Black women filmmakers. She will help finance, produce and promote their films while they take the director’s seat. 

“Women of color, women period, and people of color, women and non-binary, are underrepresented, hugely underrepresented when it comes to film and when it comes to advertisement in front of and behind the camera. After sitting on a panel with Mark Pritchard at this women’s event in New York a few years back, we walked off that stage together and we were like, ‘Man, we got to do something about this,’ and he said, ‘Yeah, we sure do,'” Latifah said, according to Essence. 

She chose six people – Idil Ibrahim, Jenn Shaw, Luchina Fisher, Vashni Korin, Imani Dennison, and Contessa Gayles – to bring their stories to life through five original documentaries and a scripted short. Throughout the year, you can look forward to these projects releasing; In Her Element and Gaps are already out and ready to watch on BET. 

“Our directors go on to hire at least 50% diverse crews and that’s one of the benefits of it, that we’re trying to build a pipeline as well, of not just great directors, but people who are qualified in every aspect of making films. Whether it’s visual effects, hair, makeup, wardrobe, costuming, cinematography, grips, gaffers, there’s so many jobs you can have,” Latifah said. “So many people are required to make one film…all the experience that could be gained is unbelievable. And that’s what we would like to build. The Queen Collective is one of the ways in which we’re doing that, and we look forward to presenting our directors and our films to you.”