Avril Z Speaks

Avril Speaks has been carving out her path as a bold, innovative storyteller for years, not only as a Producer and Director but also as a film mentor and advocate through Film Independent, the Sundance Institute, and Distribution Advocates, and formerly as a professor at Howard University. Avril has produced several award-winning films including Jinn, which premiered at SXSW and won Special Jury Recognition for Writing, and the South African film African America, which was nominated for an NAACP Image Award and four African Movie Academy Awards. She also produced the documentary Black America Is…, which premiered at the Afrikana Film Festival and won Best Feature Documentary at various film festivals.

As a director and showrunner, Avril has worked with companies such as Now This and Vox Media Studios on docu-series such as Uprooted, Keep This Between Us, and Files of the Unexplained, which debuted as the #1 show on Netflix during its entire first week. Avril is a recipient of the inaugural Dear Producer Award, the Sundance Momentum Fellowship, and is a recent recipient of the Film Independent/Netflix Amplifier Fellowship. She is a recurring creative advisor for Global Media Makers, and is one of the founding members of Distribution Advocates, where she hosts the podcast Distribution Advocates Presents. Avril is also a board member for the Black TV and Film Collective.