“If your dream only includes you, it’s too small.”

On her birthday, here is the infallible, authentic, and pioneering Queen Ava DuVernay collaborating on her many sets.

“Let Ava DuVernay tell the stories she wants to tell in the way she wants to tell them. If one of these stories just so happens to center around a man in spandex, then DuVernay has already exhibited the necessary skill and strength to make this movie, free of studio mandates, legacy liabilities, and fanboy entitlements. At this point, I’d watch her direct a drivers ed tutorial. Like the great cinematic genre-hoppers who came before her, DuVernay’s directorial print contains multitudes, and the future of cinema suddenly seems a hell of a lot brighter knowing that her inimitably unpredictable vision is a part of it.” — Matthew Eng