Michaela Coel

In 2021 Michaela Coel became the first Black woman to win the Emmy for outstanding writing for a limited series, for I May Destroy You, the drama she wrote, co-directed and starred in. She had already won two BAFTAs.

Background

Michaela Ewuraba Boakye-Collinson was born in East London on 1 October 1987 to Ghanaian parents and raised by her mother in Hackney and Tower Hamlets. She studied English and theology at the University of Birmingham before transferring to the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, the first Black woman admitted there in five years, graduating in 2012. She began as a performance poet, Michaela the Poet, from 2006.

Career

Her sitcom Chewing Gum (2015-17), which she created and starred in, won her the BAFTA for best female comedy performance. I May Destroy You (2020) won her the BAFTA for best actress in 2021. She has appeared in Black Mirror, Black Earth Rising and the film Been So Long, and won an Emmy as guest actress for the Amazon series Mr. & Mrs. Smith. She also played Aneka in Marvel's Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022).