Danai Gurira

By Tapfuma Machakaire

In a world where women are clamouring for equal rights, complaining of male chauvinism and yelling about the evils of the archaic patriarchal nature of the African society, Danai Gurira, at just over forty years of age has proved that there is no river too wide to cross.

She does not bury her head in the sand or play the blame game, instead, she takes the bull by the horns using her armour, writing and acting to drive her message home.

Gurira has excelled far more than her male counterparts and is listed as one of the best scriptwriters and actors to emerge from Zimbabwe and the African continent as a whole.

She has a breath-taking list of achievements and accolades that emanate from her determination to achieve her goals in life, inspired by her zeal to tell stories that convey ideas about strong women with whom she identifies.

The renowned actress and playwright, Danai Jekesai Gurira, was born in Grinnell, Iowa, USA on February 14, 1978.

Her parents, Roger and Josephine Gurira, moved from Southern Rhodesia to the US in 1964.

She is the youngest of four siblings. Her family lived in Grinnell until December 1983, when they moved back to Zimbabwe, just after the attainment of independence.

She did her high school education at Dominican Convent in Harare before she returned to the US where she studied at Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in psychology. Gurira also earned a Master of Fine Arts in Acting from New York University‘s Tisch School of the Arts.

She taught playwriting and acting in Liberia, Zimbabwe and South Africa. One of her earliest notable performances occurred in 2001 when she performed in a production of the Ntozake Shange play For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf, directed and choreographed by Dale Ricardo Shields.

Shields described her as “a very intelligent, strong and independent young lady.”

She won the Obie Award, an Outer Critics Circle Award, and a Helen Hayes Award for Best Lead Actress for her contribution in the writing and for acting In the Contiuum, a play that  puts a human face on the devastating impact of AIDS in Africa and America through the lives of two unforgettably courageous women. She won it first on Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company and later Off-Broadway.

In December 2011, In the Continuum was showcased at the commemoration of World AIDS Day sponsored by the United States Embassy in Zimbabwe.

In August 2009, Gurira made her acting debut on Broadway in Wilson‘s play Joe Turner’s Come and Gone playing Martha Pentecost. The play is set in the second decade of the 20th century and chronicles the lives of a few freed former enslaved African Americans in the North and deals with the conflicts of racism and discrimination.

Gurira’s 2012 play The Convert was premiered as a co-production between the Goodman Theatre in Chicago and the McCarter Theatre in New Jersey. Later that year she received the Whiting Award for an emerging playwright.

In 2015, renowned Kenyan actress, Lupita Nyong’o featured in Gurira’s play, Eclipsed . The play moved to Broadway in New York City in 2016 at the John Golden Theatre. It was the first play to premiere on Broadway with an all-female black cast and creative team. The play is set in war-torn Liberia and focuses on three women who are living as sex slaves to a rebel commander, together with one of his former wives, and a relief worker. It focuses on how the three women deal with the difficult situation. She says the inspiration for the play was a photo of Colonel Black Diamond, a female freedom fighter from Liberia.

Gurira interviewed more than 30 women who had been raped, among them young girls that had been taken by rebel fighters and turned into sex slaves. She also spoke to female peace activists who were instrumental in ending the violence.

In March 2012, Asset Management Company (AMC) announced the inclusion of Gurira on the cast of their horror-drama series The Walking Dead, the highest rated series in cable television history.In the third  season of Walking Dead Gurira plays Michonne, a relentless, katana-wielding character who joins a close-knit group in an apocalyptic world.Gurira had to learn how to ride horses for the series, which was a physical challenge she had to overcome.

On December 2, 2018, Gurira was appointed a UN Women Goodwill Ambassador. She said as goodwill ambassador, she would dedicate her support to putting a spotlight on gender equality and women’s rights, as well as propping up unheard women’s voices.

Gurira is based in Los Angeles, and identifies herself as a Zimbabwean-American. She is a superstar that prefers to keep her personal life private. She speaks four languages: French, Shona, basic Xhosa, and English.