Nia DaCosta made history, twice, when she was chosen to direct The Marvels, in August 2020. At 34, she’s the youngest-ever director of a Marvel movie, and the first Black female director of one. She has a habit of breaking records. Her previous feature, Candyman (2021), a subversive horror film co-written with Jordan Peele and Win Rosenfeld, was the first film by a Black female director to debut at No. 1 in the U.S. box office.
What stands out about DaCosta is her single-mindedness. “I have a very clear vision,” she says of her projects. DaCosta tells studio executives her idea for a film, then makes it clear that if they don’t like her vision, she isn’t right for the project. “You lose purchase on what you’re going to end up doing if you don’t have a strong idea initially,” she explains. This approach makes her entry into the Marvel universe even more impressive, as big-budget studio spectacles don’t always reward creativity.
To prepare for the shoot, DaCosta dug into her childhood archive, re-reading the Sailor Moon series and the Circle of Magic books. The result is an ensemble film uniting Captain Marvel (Brie Larson) with Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) and Ms. Marvel (the franchise’s first Muslim superhero, played by Iman Vellani). Together they form a dynamic trio on an intergalactic quest to save the world from a diabolical warrior, Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton).
DaCosta’s confidence remains now that The Marvels is in theaters, even though some critics and Marvel purists have unconvincingly picked the film apart at the seams. A few reviews combatively note that at one hour and 45 minutes, it’s the shortest Marvel film yet. “I didn’t even know about the run-time thing until it was reported on,” says DaCosta. “You have to do what’s right for the movie.”
DaCosta currently lives in London, where she’s working on a film adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s 1890 play, Hedda Gabler, which she’s set in the 1950s and stars Tessa Thompson. She spent most of her life in the United States, where she was raised in Harlem by a single mother. Creativity and performance were always part of DaCosta’s upbringing, thanks to her mom, a singer whose band wrote the theme song for the 1993 comedy Cool Runnings. Early on, she “realized that directing and writing in film is what I wanted to do.”
Asked if she still has any of her high-school screenplays tucked away, DaCosta says she keeps all of her old computers. “Probably on my old Dell computer laptop that I had back then. I’m going to be able to look at these drives—one day.”
“You have to do what’s right for the movie.”
In 2007, DaCosta enrolled in the film program at New York University. After graduating, she moved to London to attend the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, then worked as a production assistant on a series of shouty, self-involved reality shows that left her questioning the entertainment industry.
The industry has not always been kind to her. “I’m a young Black woman making movies.... There were several instances of being disrespected, being talked down to, being undermined, being belittled,” she explains. When she shared with her Marvel crew anecdotes about previous work experiences, they were appalled. “They can’t even fathom it. I feel really lucky that that’s the kind of crew I have now.”
“When I was growing up, two of the films I watched the most were Eve’s Bayou, by Kasi Lemmons, and Love & Basketball, by Gina Prince-Bythewood. They’re two Black women who were young, starting out, and are still directing,” says DaCosta. “I took for granted that women, in particular Black women, could be making films. It takes a long time for everyone to get on board. Until everyone does, you find the people who are.”
The Marvels is in theaters now
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Bridget Arsenault is the London Editor at AIR MAIL