Director Barry Jenkins wins by telling a semi-autobiographical story of his own life. Built into the film are the topics of love, masculinity and strength all set in Miami's tropical concrete jungle. Here, Barry talks with other directors about his process.

Both Denzel Washington and Viola Davis bought August Wilson's iconic characters to the big screen in the film Fences. Taking on the feat of directing this stage play turned into a film, Denzel used 98 percent of Wilson's words, only providing minor adjustments to add to the story. Listen to him talk about it HERE.

Playing real-life geniuses, Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer and Janelle Monáe lift us higher in Hidden Figures. The aerospace Venus's spread their wings and showed their mathematic muscles, earning Henson, Spencer and Monáe.

With it's tongue-in-cheek wit and relatable characters, FX's Atlanta, created by Donald Glover, is our coming of age series.

When word got out that Ava DuVernay and Oprah would be teaming up, the #BlackGirlMagic headquarters sent out a massive bulletin. Anticipation allowed for their series Queen Sugar to get on everyone's radar before the premiere. The pilot's funeral scene is what does it for us. You can tell it was meticulously handcrafted by a women who was shooting for gold.

For those who fell in love with Issa's webseries The Misadventures of an Awkward Black Girl, the idea of Rae coming to the small screen provided much excitement and some hesitation. Would bringing the concept and topics discussed in the webseries to a place like HBO dilute the message? Nope. It's still real and funny AF. Can't wait for season two.

The estranged comedian returned to host the iconic sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live to an overwhelmingly excited audience. In his opening monologue, he spoke of Trump being elected president, the Pulse night club shooting and the mass shootings all over the world.

Turning traditional Broadway on its head with hip-hop songs, Hamilton made the mainstream listen and pay attention. What's the reward? 16 Tony Award nominations and 11 wins.

Much of this year in Black Hollywood the idea of having access to roles of people of color was talked about. Back in March of last year, Tamara Hunter was named VP of Casting at Sony Pictures Entertainment, supporting all of Sony Pictures. While Tamara's presence alone won't automatically grant people of color access to more roles, her seat at the table will definitely grant access for actors of color to learn more about diverse roles that they can play.

For years, African-American weren't allowed to perform at places like Carnegie Hall, but now there's an African-American man, Robert F. Smith, acting as the chairman of the legendary performance hall.

A day before the groundbreaking 29 million views for BET's The New Edition Story, the group received their star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. For years, fans credited NE as the best R&B group of all time. On January 23, 2017, that title was solidified.