Jordan Peele
Jordan Haworth Peele is an American actor, comedian, writer, director, and producer. He is best known for his television and film work in the comedy and horror genres.
Peele's breakout role came in 2003 when he was hired as a cast member on the Fox sketch comedy series Mad TV, where he spent five seasons, leaving the show in 2008. In the following years, he and his frequent Mad TV collaborator, Keegan-Michael Key, created and starred in their own Comedy Central sketch comedy series Key & Peele. In 2014, they appeared together as FBI agents in the first season of FX's anthology series Fargo. Peele co-created the TBS comedy series The Last O.G. and the YouTube Premium comedy series Weird City. He has also served as the host and producer of the CBS All Access revival of the anthology series The Twilight Zone.
Peele and Key wrote, produced, and starred in Keanu and Peele has voice acted in Storks, and Toy Story 4. His 2017 directorial debut, the horror film Get Out, was a critical and box office success. He received numerous accolades, including the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, along with nominations for Best Picture and Best Director. He received another Academy Award nomination for Best Picture for producing Spike Lee's BlacKkKlansman. He directed, wrote, and produced the acclaimed horror film Us.
Early life
Jordan Haworth Peele was born in New York City on February 21, 1979, the son of mother Lucinda Williams and father Hayward Peele. He was raised by his single mother on Manhattan's Upper West Side. He attended the Computer School in Manhattan, graduated from The Calhoun School on Manhattan's Upper West Side, and went on to Sarah Lawrence College. After two years, Peele dropped out to form a comedy duo with college roommate and future Key & Peele writer Rebecca Drysdale.Career
2002–2009: Early beginnings and ''Mad TV''
Peele regularly performed at Boom Chicago in Amsterdam and The Second City in Chicago. He and Nicole Parker were well known for their musical duets at Boom Chicago. He portrayed a popular character called "Danish Supermodel Ute" during his time at Boom Chicago and hosted MTV's Comedy Weekend in 2002.In 2003, Peele joined the cast of Mad TV for its ninth season. Around the time Keegan-Michael Key joined the cast as a featured performer, it was assumed that Key would be chosen over Peele. The two of them ultimately were cast together after showing great comedic chemistry. Peele performed celebrity impersonations, which included favorites Caroll Spinney, Ja Rule, James Brown, Flavor Flav, Justin Guarini, Montel Williams, Morgan Freeman, Timbaland, and Forest Whitaker. Peele was absent from the first four episodes of his second season on Mad TV. He made a cameo in "Weird Al" Yankovic's video "White & Nerdy" with Mad TV co-star Keegan-Michael Key.
Peele was nominated for a 2008 Emmy Award for his song "Sad Fitty Cent", a music video parody about 50 Cent lamenting over his rivalry with Kanye West. The lyrics were, according to the music video, written by Peele, and he was involved in arranging its music. In 2009 he appeared in Little Fockers.
Peele appeared in a viral video titled "Hillary vs Obama" where he and a Hillary Clinton supporter argue over whether Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama would make a better president, only to get upstaged by a Rudy Giuliani supporter.
Peele auditioned to be a castmember for Saturday Night Live when SNL producers were looking for someone to play Barack Obama. Peele remained at Mad TV and the role went to Fred Armisen until September 2012, when Jay Pharoah took over the role.
After five seasons on Mad TV, Peele left the cast at the end of the 13th season.
2010–2016: ''Key & Peele''
In 2010, Peele co-starred in the Fox comedy pilot The Station, and appeared with a recurring role in the Adult Swim series Childrens Hospital. He had a supporting role in the David Wain-directed comedy Wanderlust, which was released in 2012.Peele and his former Mad TV castmate and friend Keegan-Michael Key starred in their own Comedy Central sketch series Key & Peele, from 2012 to 2015. The series was a success with viewers, and spawned several skits and videos that went viral online.
In 2014, Peele played an FBI agent in the first season of the FX anthology series Fargo, based on the 1996 film of the same name.
In 2016, Peele starred in and produced, with Key, the first feature film in which the two both had leading roles, Keanu. The film received generally favorable reviews from critics.
2017–present: Success as a filmmaker
In February 2017, Peele's first film as solo director, Get Out, was released to critical acclaim, eventually scoring a 99% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The film received particular praise for Peele's screenplay and direction, as well as the performance of its lead, Daniel Kaluuya, and was chosen by the National Board of Review, the American Film Institute, and Time magazine as one of the top 10 films of the year. The Atlantic called the film "a masterpiece."Get Out proved to be popular with movie audiences, and it eventually became one of the most profitable horror films, and films of 2017, and grossed over $255 million on a budget of $4.5 million. For his work on the film, Peele received significant attention, as well as numerous accolades, including the Bingham Ray Breakthrough Director Award at the 2017 Gotham Independent Film Awards.
The film also received four nominations at the 90th Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Director and Best Original Screenplay nominations for Peele, as well as a Best Actor nomination for Kaluuya. Peele won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, becoming the first black screenwriter to win in this category. He became the third person, after Warren Beatty and James L. Brooks, to be nominated for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay for a debut film, and the first black person to receive them for any one film. Get Out also earned him the Writers Guild of America Award for Best Original Screenplay, as well as nominations for a Directors Guild of America Award and a BAFTA Award for Best Original Screenplay.
In early 2018 Peele announced his intention to retire from acting, stating in an interview with CBS "Acting is just nowhere near as fun for me as directing". In 2018, Peele co-created the TBS comedy series The Last O.G., starring Tracy Morgan and Tiffany Haddish. Also in 2018, Peele co-produced the Spike Lee film, BlacKkKlansman which was released to critical acclaim and was a box office success. The film received six nominations at the 91st Academy Awards including the Best Picture nomination for Peele.
On June 28, 2018, it was announced that YouTube Premium will release Weird City, which is co-created by Peele and Charlie Sanders. The show was released on February 13, 2019 to critical acclaim. On April 5, 2018, it was announced that Amazon Video had given a series order to the docuseries Lorena consisting of four episodes. The series was set to be directed by Joshua Rofé who would also executive produce alongside Peele, Win Rosenfeld, Steven J. Berger, Jenna Santoianni, and Tom Lesinski. Production companies involved with the series include Monkeypaw Productions, Sonar Entertainment, and Number 19. It ultimately premiered on February 15, 2019.
Peele's second film as director was Us, a horror-thriller film which he also wrote and produced, starring Lupita Nyong'o, Winston Duke, Elisabeth Moss, and Tim Heidecker. After having its world premiere on March 8, the film was released in the United States on March 22, 2019 by Universal Pictures, Monkeypaw Productions, and QC Entertainment. Peele developed and is narrator for the science fiction web television series The Twilight Zone, the third revival of the original 1959-64 anthology series that aired on CBS, for CBS All Access. The show premiered on April 1, 2019, with Peele, Simon Kinberg and Marco Ramirez as executive producers.
Future projects
On November 3, 2015, it was reported that Henry Selick is developing Wendell and Wild, a new stop-motion feature with Jordan Peele and Keegan-Michael Key based on an original story by Selick. In March 2018, the film was picked up by Netflix. There have been developments of several films based on Peele's sketch comedy series Key & Peele. In March 2015, it was announced that Key will reprise the role of Mr. Garvey in a feature-length film Substitute Teacher with Peele portraying a rival teacher. In March 2017 in a Reddit AMA, Peele expressed interest in developing a film around his Key & Peele character Wendell Sanders based on the music video "The Power of Wings". The film, titled Wendell Meets Middle-Earth, would follow Wendell's existence in the fantasy world that he likes to see his life in.Peele will produce the HBO series Lovecraft Country written by Underground co-creator Misha Green. In May 2018, Amazon ordered a 10 episode series about hunting down Nazis called Hunters, which is produced by Peele.
In September 2018, it was announced Peele was in talks to produce a remake of Candyman, through his Monkeypaw Productions, of which Candyman star Tony Todd stated in a 2018 interview with , "I’d rather have him do it, someone with intelligence, who’s going to be thoughtful and dig into the whole racial makeup of who Candyman is and why he existed in the first place." In November 2018, it was confirmed that Peele will produce the film with Universal and MGM and will partner with Win Rosenfeld to co-produce the film, while Nia DaCosta will sign on as director. The new Candyman will serve as a "spiritual sequel", taking place back in the new gentrified Cabrini Green, where the old housing projects development once stood in Chicago. The theatrical release is set for September 25, 2020.
Influences
In February 2017, Peele curated the Brooklyn Academy of Music film series "The Art of the Social Thriller", comprising 12 films that inspired the making of Get Out, including the horror films Rosemary's Baby, Night of the Living Dead, The Shining, Candyman, The People Under the Stairs, Scream, The Silence of the Lambs, Funny Games, Misery, the thrillers Rear Window and The 'Burbs, and the 1967 racial comedy-drama Guess Who's Coming to Dinner.As a comedian, Peele counts among his influences In Living Color, Richard Pryor and Dave Chappelle. He also has listed Steve Martin and Martin Lawrence as arguably his two biggest influences.
Personal life
Through his mother, Lucinda Williams, Peele is descended from the colonial Woodhull Family, whose prominent members include brigadier general Nathaniel Woodhull and Culper Ring Spy Abraham Woodhull.Peele began dating Chelsea Peretti in 2013. They became engaged in November 2015, and Peretti announced in April 2016 that she and Peele had eloped. They have a son named Beaumont.