John Oluwole ADEkoje is an award-winning filmmaker, playwright, and educator whose work spans theater, documentary, and narrative film. He is a national recipient of the Kennedy Center’s ACTF Lorraine Hansberry Playwriting Award for his play Street Hawker. His documentary Street Soldiers earned the Roxbury International Film Festival’s Emerging Local Filmmaker Award and was screened at major festivals including the Pan African Film Festival, the World Film Festival–Montreal, and BronzeLens Film Festival in Atlanta, as well as Cannes (Pan African Film Festival showcase).
He is also a recipient of the Brother Thomas Fellowship Award and a Playwriting Fellow at the Huntington Theatre Company. His narrative feature Knockaround Kids received the Emerging Filmmaker Award at the Roxbury International Film Festival, screened at Urbanworld Film Festival in New York, and is available on Tubi, Amazon Prime, Google Play, Apple TV, and other digital platforms.
In theater and digital performance, ADEkoje served as co-director and director of photography for the digital adaptation of Hype Man (Company One / American Repertory Theatre), and as writer, director, and projection/art designer for The Triggered Life Project (Portland Playhouse).
His work has received international recognition, including selection at FESPACO (Best of FESPACO program), Afrikamera Berlin, and a nomination for Best Short at the Pan African Film Festival in Los Angeles. He is also a recipient of the World Cinema Fund Design Award for the feature film The Third Gele, which was selected for development at the prestigious Ouaga Film Lab in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso.
His short film Ye! has also been presented at Festival Cinémas d’Afrique Lausanne in Switzerland.
ADEkoje teaches Media Arts and Theatre at Boston Arts Academy.
