Oscar Micheaux

Oscar Micheaux was the Jackie Robinson of film, the black D. W. Griffith--a bigger-than-life American folk hero whose important life story has been nearly forgotten today. The son of freed slaves, he roamed America as a Pullman porter before making his first mark as a homesteader in South Dakota--and going on from there to become the king of the "race cinema" industry, producing and/or directing nearly forty films during a time of Jim Crow segregation when African-American artists were not welcome in Hollywood.
In this groundbreaking new biography, award-winning film historian Patrick McGilligan offers a vivid and fascinating portrait of a true pioneer of American culture who was equal parts visionary, hustler, huckster, innovator, and raffish Barnum-like showman--and the first great African-American filmmaker.

Film historian and writer Patrick McGilligan's books include biographies of Alfred Hitchcock, Clint Eastwood, Robert Altman, James Cagney, George Cukor, Fritz Lang, Oscar Micheaux, Jack Nicholson, Nicholas Ray, Orson Welles and Mel Brooks. He is also the editor of Backstory, a series of interview books with screenwriters, published by the University of California Press.