Kerry Washington

Anthropology as the foundation of the script

Kerry Washington grew up in the Bronx with no intention of walking the red carpet. She studied anthropology and sociology at George Washington University because her original plan was to understand human behavior through academia. But theater crossed her path, and she ended up graduating with an acting scholarship.

In 2001, she appeared in Save the Last Dance. It was a supporting role in which she played a teenage single mother in Chicago. She caught critics' attention without carrying the weight of a lead role.

And the phone started ringing more often.

In 2004, she played Della Bea Robinson in Ray. The shoot was intense, and the chemistry with Jamie Foxx paid off at the box office. Shortly after, she filmed The Last King of Scotland in 2006. In this film she played Kay Amin and worked alongside Forest Whitaker in a production that demanded complete emotional restraint.

Wielding power in prime time

Before 2012, Black actresses rarely led a drama on American television. Shonda Rhimes offered her the role of Olivia Pope in Scandal, and Washington accepted the challenge. The series ran for seven seasons and drew more than 12 million viewers at its peak ratings.

Olivia Pope was no perfect heroine. She was a woman who fixed political messes while her own personal life was falling apart. In the show's final seasons, Washington earned 250,000 dollars per episode.

But she wanted control over where the stories came from.

In 2016, she founded her own production company, Simpson Street. The name is a tribute to the street where her grandparents lived in the Bronx. The first project under this label was Confirmation, an HBO film in which she played Anita Hill.

Total control of executive production

The industry changed, and she adapted quickly. In 2020, she produced and starred in Little Fires Everywhere alongside Reese Witherspoon. The miniseries adapted Celeste Ng's novel and focused on class and racial conflicts in a residential area of Ohio.

Her commitment to creative control was total.

During 2023, she premiered the series UnPrisoned on Hulu. She plays a therapist who has to live with her father, who has just been released from prison. As executive producer, she gets to choose projects that move away from the usual stereotypes in the Los Angeles market.

In 2024, she worked under Tyler Perry in Six Triple Eight. The film tells the story of the only all-Black women's battalion to serve overseas during World War II. The production budget for this film exceeded 50 million dollars.