Malia Obama’s Screenwriting Career Is Apparently Legit

Malia Obama has long preferred to stay behind the scenes, and lately, she’s been doing so literally. On Thursday night, at the season 3 premiere of Atlanta in Los Angeles, creator and star Donald Glover officially confirmed one of the worst kept secret in Hollywood: the 23-year-old has joined the writers room of his next Amazon series. (Tentatively titled Hive, the show is reportedly centered around a “Beyoncé-like figure.”) It’s a coveted position, and Glover is here to assure you that connections aren’t all that got her the gig. “She’s just like, an amazingly talented person,” he told Vanity Fair of former president Barack Obama’s eldest daughter. “She’s really focused, and she’s working really hard.”

Glover waited just over a year to confirm the news, which unnamed sources unofficially shared with the Hollywood Reporter in February of 2021. At the time, it seemed somewhat unlikely; Malia was in the midst of her studies at Harvard, and official confirmation from Amazon never followed. You’d think there’d be at least some urge to trumpet the fact. Malia’s parents Higher Ground productions has a much trumpeted mega-deal with Amazon Primes’s arch rivals Netflix, after all.

However much time they’ve actually been working together, it’s been long enough for Glover to give Malia his full endorsement. “Her writing style is great,” he continued. “I feel like she’s just somebody who’s gonna have really good things coming soon.”

Malia first entered the Hollywood sphere with an internship at HBO in 2015, followed by another at the Weinstein Company (back when Harvey Weinstein was known for being a Hollywood power player instead of, you know, Harvey Weinstein). From the sound of it, the Glover are having a much easier time keeping their cool around the 23-year-old than some of her previous employers. Lena Dunham has gushed about spending time with Malia on the set of Girls, as has Halle Berry about her time with Malia on the set of the sci-fi show Extant. “It was kind of wild,” she said in 2017. “We just couldn’t really see her as [a production assistant], but to her credit, she tried very hard to be one.”