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Filmmaker Thato Mwosa on 'Memoirs of a Black Girl' and true stories of Africa

On the podcast: Documentary filmmaker Thato Mwosa ’17 turns to fiction with a feature length film inspired by her students.

Find the full transcript after the Episode Notes.

Episode notes

Even though MFA in Creative Writing alum Thato Mwosa ’17 grew up in Botswana, her dolls were white and so were most of the faces she saw on TV. When American shows like "Sister, Sister," "The Fresh Prince of Bel Air," and "Martin" began airing in her country, Thato was enthralled. Now, she is using her varied creative interests to celebrate and tell the stories of Black and African people, from her award-winning film, Memoirs of a Black Girl, to a book on accomplished African women and even an Africa-themed trivia game.

About Thato

Thato Mwosa is an award-winning illustrator, screenwriter, playwright, and filmmaker. Her films have been broadcast nationally and internationally. Thato’s first feature film, Memoirs of a Black Girl, premiered at the 2021 Boston Globe’s Black History Month Film Festival where it won the Best Feature Film award at the 2021 Hamilton Black Film Festival and the 2021 the Roxbury International Film Festival. Additionally, Thato won Best Feature Director at the 2021 Hamilton Film Festival.

Her plays, Jeremy’s Box and Look at Me, have been produced by Scribe Stages in Los Angeles. In 2021, Thato was selected for Company One’s Playlab Circuit Volt Playwriting Lab. She was a finalist for the 2019 Mass Cultural Art Fellowship in the Dramatic Writing category. Thato's latest script, A Blue Dawn, is a quarter-finalist for the Academy Nicholl Fellowship and a semi-finalist for the 2021 Writer Lab NY. 

Thato's artwork has been featured at the Wortiz Gallery, Dudley Cafe and The Amory. In the summer of 2020, Thato launched an African trivia card game SAWA Trivia. In the summer of 2021 she released her first book, 14 African Women Who Made History.

Thato has a dual degree in TV/Film Production and Marketing/Advertising Communications from Emerson College and an MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen from Lesley University. She currently serves on the boards of Women in Film New England, Roxbury Community College Broadcasting Program, and Boston Neighborhood Network in Boston. Thato is a film instructor at Brookline High School in Brookline and Emerson College.

Learn more about Thato on her website.(link is external)

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