Although he was not the first black filmmaker, Oscar Micheaux was the first black director to produce a feature-length film, and he was certainly the most prolific producer of race films for nearly thirty years. With no film experience at all, Micheaux produced a feature-length version of his self-published novel The Homesteader in 1919. Over the next three decades, Micheaux would make 41 more films, creating his own cottage industry of stars that included Paul Robeson (who made his film debut in Micheaux’s 1925 film Body and Soul), Lorenzo Tucker (often billed as “The Black Valentino”), Alec Lovejoy, Carman Newsome and Laura Bowman. Micheaux traveled cross-country with his films in the trunk of his car, showing the movies anywhere he could screen them.
To learn more about filmmakers like Oscar Micheaux, check out my new book Black Film: A History of Black Representation and Participation in the Movies, which will be released by Ten Speed Press on March 24, 2026. You can pre-order the book here.
