John Singleton was an African American filmmaker, born in Los Angeles on January 6, 1968, who graduated from USC’s Filmic Writing program in 1990. He entered the program under founding director Margaret Mehring, and his senior thesis became Boyz n the Hood, the 1991 film he wrote and directed, a story of three friends coming of age in South Central Los Angeles. The Academy nominated the film for both Best Director and Best Original Screenplay, and its success made him, at 24, the youngest person ever nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director and the first African American nominated in that category.
Singleton followed with films including Poetic Justice, Higher Learning and the revival-era Shaft, and worked across television as well. In 2017, he began producing, writing and directing Snowfall, the FX drama set in 1980s Los Angeles. He continued to return to USC as a teacher and mentor. In spring 2016, he taught Emergence of Multicultural Cinema, sharing experiences from film sets and inviting students to question him about the industry. He also helped launch the school’s diversity speaker series in 2017.
In USC’s retrospective, filmmakers Rick Famuyiwa and Sheldon Candis described how Singleton’s example influenced their own ambitions.
Singleton died on April 29, 2019, at 51, after suffering a stroke earlier that month. The school’s tribute remembered his willingness to remain after events and talk with students.
