Melissa Haizlip is a New York-based producer and director who attended Yale University. Her film Mr. SOUL!, about Ellis Haizlip and his public affairs TV show SOUL!, also known as the first "Black Tonight Show," won the International Documentary Association award for Best Music Documentary. She is Co-Executive Producer of the original Netflix series, WHO YOU CALLIN A B*TCH, about the history of Black womanhood in America, explored through the lens of women in hip-hop, their lives and their music.
Films
Mr. SOUL!
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(2018)
Before Oprah, before Arsenio, there was Mr. SOUL. Ellis Haizlip ensures that the Revolution would be televised with "SOUL!," America's first "Black Tonight Show." From 1968 to 1973, the public-television variety show SOUL!, guided by charismatic producer and host Ellis Haizlip, offered an unfiltered, uncompromising celebration of Black literature, poetry, music, and politics—voices that had few other options for national exposure, and, as a result, found the program an improbable place to call home.
