Regina King

Regina King is an American actress and director whose work spans television, film, and stage across more than four decades. She has won an Academy Award and multiple Primetime Emmy Awards, and is recognized for both her dramatic performances and her growing body of work behind the camera.

Early life

King was born on January 15, 1971, in Los Angeles, California. She was raised in the View Park-Windsor Hills area of Los Angeles by her mother, a special education teacher, after her parents divorced. She began acting as a teenager and later attended the University of Southern California. Her early exposure to performing came through television, and she balanced schooling with professional work from a young age.

Career

King first gained attention as Brenda Jenkins on the NBC sitcom "227," which she joined in 1985 and appeared on through 1990. She transitioned into film with roles in John Singleton's "Boyz n the Hood" (1991) and "Poetic Justice" (1993). Through the 1990s and 2000s she built a steady career with supporting and leading parts in films including "Jerry Maguire," "Enemy of the State," "How Stella Got Her Groove Back," and "Ray," the latter a biographical drama about Ray Charles. She also lent her voice to animated series, voicing characters on "The Boondocks."

King's reputation grew significantly through prestige television. She won consecutive Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Limited Series or Movie for the ABC anthology "American Crime," and another for the Netflix series "Seven Seconds." Her film career reached a high point with "If Beale Street Could Talk" (2018), Barry Jenkins's adaptation of the James Baldwin novel, for which she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.

Recent work

In 2019 King starred as Angela Abar in HBO's limited series "Watchmen," a continuation of the comic series, winning another Emmy for the role. She made her feature directorial debut with "One Night in Miami" (2020), a drama imagining a meeting among Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, Sam Cooke, and Jim Brown; the film premiered at the Venice Film Festival and earned awards-season recognition. She had earlier directed episodes of television series including "Scandal," "This Is Us," and "Insecure." King continued to take on acting and producing projects, including the historical drama "Shirley" (2024), in which she portrayed congresswoman and presidential candidate Shirley Chisholm. Across her career she has been noted for advocating greater representation and opportunity for women and people of color in the entertainment industry.