Nia DaCosta is a writer and director from Brooklyn, New York. She has written and directed projects for stage, film and new media platforms. Her debut feature Little Woods, developed through the Sundance Institute, stars Tessa Thompson and Lily James. It premiered at 2018’s Tribeca Film Festival and and was released theatrically by Neon.

Nia directed and co-adapted Candyman with Jordan Peele, released by Monkeypaw Productions, MGM and Universal. The film had a $20.4M opening weekend, making Nia the first Black female director to debut a movie in the No. 1 weekend spot at the domestic box office.

She directed two episodes of the third season of Netflix revival, Top Boy. For Tango Productions, Nia wrote an original Sci-fi thriller feature script and is attached to direct. She has also been commissioned to write and direct a feature for BBC Films. Nia worked as a writer for the HBO series Industry with U.K.'s Bad Wolf.

Nia's additional credits include playlet Kingdom Come at Leicester Square Theatre in London, the game show Sagmeister v Walsh for Adobe (Behance), and the documentary Shark Loves the Amazon. DaCosta developed her voice through London theatre. In 2012, she was founder and artistic director of the theatre collective, The Once and Future. Founded so as to give a platform to the many writers she knew in London, the collective produced four play readings, countless workshops and a short film. Their final production was Need/Want/Crave at the Leicester Square Theatre; two playlets developed in association with The Factory theatre and co-produced by Theatre Renegade (“Scarlet”). DaCosta received a BFA in Film and Television from Tisch School of the Arts at NYU and a MA in Writing for Stage and Broadcast Media from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in London.