Margaret Brown

Margaret Brown is an American film director who has directed four feature length documentaries. Her film Descendant, about the descendants of survivors of the last ship to carry enslaved Africans into the United States, was shortlisted for the 2023 Academy Awards. Early life and education Brown was born and raised in Mobile, Alabama. A Murphy High School alumna, she earned her BA from Brown University with concentrations in Creative Writing and Modern Culture and Media, and her MFA in Film from New York University. Career Brown served as cinematographer for 99 Threadwaxing in 1999 and director for Ice Fishing in 2000. Her full-length debut was Be Here To Love Me: A Film About Townes Van Zandt (2004) which chronicles the turbulent life of American singer-songwriter Townes Van Zandt. Time Out magazine listed it at number 7 on its "50 Greatest Music Films Ever". She subsequently directed the feature documentary The Order of Myths a 2008 Sundance Film Festival selection about the segregated Mardi Gras celebration of Mobile, Alabama. The film was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award. It won many awards including a Peabody Award, a Cinematic Vision Award at the Silverdocs Documentary Festival and Truer Than Fiction Award at the Independent Spirit Awards.