Biography
Born January 13, 1958, in Martinique, French West Indies, Euzhan Palcy is a leader for black people, especially black women, in cinema. She is a screenwriter, producer and director. After studying the likes of Billy Wilder and Orson Welles and receiving a few degrees, including one from Louis Lumière College, she directed her first feature, Sugar Cane Alley (1983), in Paris for less than a million dollars. The film is about an impoverished black family making sacrifices for a young boy on a plantation in Martinique during the 1930s. It won numerous awards internationally, among them the César Award and the Venice Film Festival Silver Lion. Palcy's second feature, A Dry White Season (1989), explored the politics of South African apartheid, beckoning actor Marlon Brando to end his nine-year retirement to portray lawyer Ian McKenzie in it. With A Dry White Season, Palcy became the first black woman director produced by a major Hollywood studio. The film was banned in South Africa for a period of time. Brando's direction by Palcy earned him his final Academy Award nomination, for Best Supporting Actor. This made Palcy the first director who is black to direct an actor to such an honor. Palcy has continued to produce and make films all the way into the 2010s.
Awards & recognition
- Academy Honorary Award · 2022
- Women in Film Honors · 2018
- Afro-Caribbean Arts Trophies · 2010
- Knight of the National Order of Merit · 1995
- Guggenheim Fellowship · 1994
Show all 14 awards →
- Candace Award · 1990
- César Award · 1984
- César Award — Best First Film · 1984
- Grand Jury Prize of the Venice Film Festival · 1983
- Silver Lion · 1983
- Knight of the Legion of Honour
- Officer of the Legion of Honour
- Officer of the National Order of Merit
- César Award — Best First Film · 1984 · nominated
