ABDUL MALIK ABBOTT - Filmmaker Bio

Born in New York and raised in Harlem, Abdul Malik Abbott at an early age decided to follow in the footsteps of his father, Randy Omar Mubarak Abbott to become a filmmaker and photographer. As a teen, Abdul attended the acclaimed High School of Music & Art as a painter and illustrator, with his work constantly displayed at the school’s semi-annual events as well as winning several prizes at local Comic conventions for his illustrations of comic book and fantasy art. During those four years of studying art at M&A, he attended the School of Visual Arts’ film animation programs on the weekends.
After graduating from Music & Art, he enrolled in the School of Visual Arts (SVA) with film being his major and worked during the summers as a P.A. on several feature films as well as studying documentary production as DCTV (Downtown Community Television) and Educational Video Center (EVC). Abdul graduated from SVA at the top of his class with a Bachelor degree in fine arts and a completed thesis short film entitled "99%".
 
During the next few years, Abdul worked as a sound technician on several commercials, TV shows and feature films including, "Def By Temptation", "City Of Hope" and Spike Lee’s "Do The Right Thing" and "Mo’ Better Blues". Eventually, he started working on music videos as a sound "playback" technician.
Soon after, Abdul commenced on the journey of his second career as a music video editor, cutting clips for new and well established hip hop and R&B artists.

Abdul’s big break came when Jive records gave him a chance to direct a video for a new Hip Hop group called "2 Too Many", a group formed and produced by Will Smith. After completing the video, he began shopping his reel as a director/editor. Abdul soon landed his next video for a jazz track by the legendary singer/actress - Abbey Lincoln. The video "People In Me", won Abdul a GoldAward for "Best Jazz video".
Soon after he was commissioned to direct a video for a hip-hop trio called Original Flavor -"All that". That’s where he met the group’s manager Damon Dash and his partner Jay-Z of the newly formed Roc-a-fella records. Abdul was soon hired to Direct and Produce Jay-Z’s first video, "I Can’t Get Wit That", followed by both versions of Jay-Z’s "In My Lifetime" videos.
In the next few years Abdul directed several other videos for Jay-Z including the #1 videos for the songs "Ain’t No"(featuring Foxy Brown) and "Dead Presidents" as well videos for other established and up and coming rap, R&B and gospel artists.

In the ‘98 Abdul collaborated with Damon Dash and Jay-Z to direct a series of "B-side" videos interwoven with narrative skits for Jay-Z’s new album. The project was shot over an eight-day period with an extremely modest budget. The project was entitled "Streets Is Watching". It was a huge hit amongst new and old fans, earning the #1 slot for several weeks in Billboard magazine’s "long form music video category" and eventually certified platinum.

"STATE PROPERTY"- (Lions Gate Films/Roc-a-fella Films) marked the feature film directorial debut for Abdul Malik Abbott. It was released in theaters in several major U.S cities and was a hit with old and new fans. The hip-hop driven gangster film was shot for under a million and has grossed close to 10 million to date. After being released on home video and DVD, “State Property” rose to be the 10th top selling video in the U.S. according to Videoscan and Billboard. Both Roc-a-fella projects that Abdul has directed has earned close to 16 million dollars in sales and profits.

In 2003 Abdul was invited to join the prestigious Director’s Guild of America as a feature film director and is currently co-chair of the African American Steering Committee’s Activities & Events Committee at the DGA as well as being a member of the WGA(w)’s Committee of Black Writers.
Abdul has also appeared on several film/music video related panels during a number of film festivals and conferences as well as starring in a pilot for a VH1 reality show called “Video Playground” , which showcases current directors remaking 80’s videos with kids playing the lead roles. Abdul also appeared as himself on the VH1 series “Driven: Jay-Z” in which the long-form video “Streets Is Watching” was praised in helping transforming Jay-Z into “superstar” status.
Abdul recently directed videos for Gospel artist, Kevin L and rap artist Saigon from the HBO series “Entourage”. The video “Pain in my Life” recently won a 2008 Telly Award. 

Mr. Abbott currently resides in LA and spends time in NYC and ATL where he continues to direct, write, edit and produce. Abdul also works as a freelance videographer for several entertainment channels, including BET, TLC and MTV. He is currently in post-production for a feature film he co-wrote and produced entitled “My Normal”.