‘Queen & Slim’ Director Melina Matsoukas Signs First-Look Deal at FX

FX Productions has signed director Melina Matsoukas to a first-look deal.

Under the deal, the Queen & Slim helmer will develop projects for FX Networks. Matsoukas also directed the pilot for FX’s upcoming Y, based on comic book Y: The Last Man, episodes of HBO’s Insecure and Beyoncé’s Lemonade.

“Melina is an enormously talented director and producer,” said Nick Grad, president original programming at FX Entertainment. “We’re especially excited that Melina has such a depth of directing experience across film, commercials, music videos and television, and look forward to developing projects that draw on her bold vision and great skill.”

Her pact with FX Productions follows on the heels of Counterpart creator Justin Marks signing an overall deal with the company. FXP produces Snowfall, Atlanta, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Archer, Better Things and What We Do in the Shadows for its sibling cable networks, along with Y — where Matsoukas is also an executive producer — and the upcoming Breeders. It co-produces a number of other shows on FX, including Pose, Mayans MC, American Crime Story and Fargo.

Matsoukas has won a pair of Grammy Awards for best music video, for Beyoncé’s “Formation” and Rihanna’s “We Found Love.” She also earned a Directors Guild Award nomination in 2018 for the “Thankgsiving” episode of Master of None, written by Lena Waithe.

She and Waithe collaborated again on Queen & Slim, which is due in theaters Nov. 27.

Matsoukas is repped by MXN, CAA, ID and Gang Tyre.

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