Spike Lee, byname of Shelton Jackson Lee, (born March 20, 1957, Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.), American filmmaker known for his uncompromising provocative approach to controversial subject matter. The son of the jazz composer Bill Lee, he was reared in a middle-class Brooklyn neighbourhood. He majored in communications at Atlanta’s Morehouse College, where he directed his first Super-8 films and met his future coproducer, Monty Ross. In 1978 Lee entered New York University’s Graduate Film School, where he met another future collaborator, cinematographer Ernest Dickerson. He gained national attention with his master’s thesis, the short subject Joe’s Bed-Stuy Barbershop: We Cut Heads
As the BlacKkKlansman film-maker picks up the British Film Institute’s top honour, he talks about being accused of provoking race riots, why his Malcolm X biopic will endure – and the problem with awards