Martin Desmond Roe | |
---|---|
Nationality | British, American |
Alma mater |
University of Southern California (MFA, Cinema-Television, 2008) Somerville College, Oxford (B.A., Classics, 2001) |
Occupation(s) | Film director, film producer, screenwriter |
Years active | 2009–present |
Known for | Buzkashi Boys, Tom vs Time, Breaking2, Kobe Bryant's Muse [1] |
Website |
dirtyrobber |
Martin Desmond Roe is a British-American film and television director, writer, and producer. [2] [3] [1] He is best known for Buzkashi Boys (2012), [4] [5] Kobe Bryant's Muse (2015), [6] [3] Breaking2 (2017), [2] [7] [8] Tom vs Time (2018), [9] and We are the Champions (2020). [10] [11] [12] Roe is the founder and Creative Director of Dirty Robber, a Los Angeles–based production company. [3]
Martin Roe's short film Two Distant Strangers was met with critical acclaim; at the 93rd Academy Awards, it received the Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film. [13] [14]
Born in Bristol, England, [15] Roe studied Latin and Ancient Greek at Somerville College, Oxford, [16] graduating in 2001 with a BA in Classics. He moved to Los Angeles and entered the USC School of Cinematic Arts, earning an MFA in Cinema and Television in 2008. [17] [18]
Roe became interested in filmmaking and storytelling while staging plays during his time at Oxford. After finishing USC film school he founded Dirty Robber, a production company. [16] His first major success came in 2012 when Roe co-wrote the screenplay for Buzkashi Boys, a short film that was directed by Sam French. [5] Written in a week, on location in Kabul, Afghanistan, the film was inspired by the true life story of Fawad Mohammidi, [19] a homeless 14 year old street vendor and explored his friendship with another boy and their love for the traditional horse sport Buzkashi. [5] Buzkashi Boys gained critical acclaim [20] [21] winning numerous film festival awards, [22] [23] [24] and was nominated for the 2013 Best Live Action Short Film at the Academy Awards. [4]
In 2017, after directing a number of commercials for Nike, Inc., [25] Roe was invited as creative lead on Breaking2 sports documentary, a joint project of Nike and National Geographic in association with Dirty Robber. [26] The documentary short followed three world class athletes, Eliud Kipchoge, Lelisa Desisa, and Zersenay Tadese as they attempted to run a marathon in under two hours. [8] [27] Breaking2 won several awards in advertising industry [28] [29] including a Gold Lion at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. [30] Roe also took part as an executive producer of 6 episodes for Tom vs Time, a collaborative web television series project directed by Gotham Chopra, which won Emmy Award for Outstanding Serialized Sports Documentary (NBC Sports). [9] In 2020, he co-directed the short film Two Distant Strangers, about police killings in the United States, which stars Joey Bada$$ and Andrew Howard, and which won the Academy Award for Best Live Action Short in 2021. [31]
In 2023, Roe co-directed alongside Travon Free, BS High a documentary for HBO, revolving around the Bishop Sycamore High School scandal. [32] [33]
Roe is an owner and creative director of Dirty Robber Productions, a Los Angeles-based company with the focus on documentaries, T.V series, shows and sports events. Among Dirty Robber's most notable productions are Religion of Sports, [34] [35] Tom vs Time, [36] Kobe Bryant’s Muse (in collaboration with Kobe Inc.), [37] [38] Why We Fight (ESPN+), Wiz Khalifa: Behind the Cam (DIRECTV), [39] and We are the Champions, a documentary series about various contests and sports traditions. [3] [40]
Year | Title | Credit | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
2023 | BS High | Co-director | Documentary film |
2020 | Two Distant Strangers | Co-director | Short [41] |
2020 | We are the Champions | Executive producer (6 episodes) Director (2 episodes) |
TV documentary series [2] |
2019 | Wiz Khalifa: Behind the Cam | Director (5 episodes) |
TV documentary mini-series [2] |
2019 | Why We Fight | Executive producer (15 episodes) |
TV documentary series [27] |
2018 | Shut Up and Dribble | Executive producer (3 episodes) |
TV documentary series [42] |
2018 | Tom vs Time | Executive producer (6 episodes) |
Documentary
web television series (Emmy Award Winner) [9] |
2017 | Breaking2 | Director | TV movie documentary Cannes Gold Lions Winner Co-production of National Geographic Studios and Dirty Robber Productions [8] [43] |
2017 | Uninterrupted Presents | Executive producer (2 episodes) |
TV series documentary |
2016 | Religion of Sports | Executive producer (18 episodes) Director Writer |
TV series documentary [44] [45] |
2015 | Kobe Bryant's Muse | Producer | TV movie documentary [6] |
2012 | Buzkashi Boys | Co-producer Co-writer |
Short |