While the Jussie Smollett scandal has rocked the hit show Empire, it hasn’t rocked Executive Producer Sanaa Hamri. Empire may be on its final season, but Hamri is just getting started.
“I feel like I’m still at the beginning of my journey,” she says. Fox recently greenlit a pilot for her new show, a “dramedy” whose first season takes place during one wedding night.
A rare Moroccan woman producing in Hollywood, Hamri has emerged as a premier talent shaping the future of American television.
Sanaa Hamri Drives Nearly Every Aspect of Empire’s Production
Hamri initially won acclaim as a director of music videos (her clip for Nicki Manaj’s “Super Bass” has nearly 800 million views) and commercials (see her Jenny Craig campaign featuring Mariah Carey). But its her work on the record-setting series Empire that has elevated her profile to industry star status.
On a typical day producing Empire, Hamri mingles in the writer’s room; scuttles off to the music producers’ studio; huddles with the actors; and then meets dancers to review choreography for the episode’s performance.
For Hamri, wearing so many different hats comes naturally.
“Not to sound cliché, but women are the greatest multi-taskers there are,” she remarks. “I’ve always been by nature a multi-tasker. I love delegating. I’m also very organized. Listen, it’s a lot of hours. I feel like it’s a lot of hard work, but I love it.”
Hamri’s Upbringing Prepared Her for Success
The only child of Moroccan painter Mohamed Hamri and Blanche Hamri, a Jewish-American who worked at the American School of Tangier, Hamri had a multicultural upbringing that exposed her to the arts from an early age.
Hamri attended the American School, where she was often the only girl at a time when drug trafficking and political unrest made Tangier a dangerous place to live.
“If you survive that environment as a woman and a free thinker, you go elsewhere and it’s easy,” she remembers. “I didn’t grow up wealthy, and the street environment taught me a lot.”
Hamri earned a degree in theatre arts at Sarah Lawrence College and then worked as a receptionist for a music video production company. After teaching herself how to edit video, she helped remix the clip for Maria Carey’s “Thank God I Found You” and got to know the multi-platinum recording artist personally. Carey encouraged Hamri to become a director.
“Mariah had never encountered a multicultural woman who was from somewhere else who edited music videos,” Hamri recalls. Soon the young Moroccan immigrant was directing artists like Eminem, Dr. Dre, and Prince.
“Very quickly, I started to feel contained by the three minutes,” Hamri explains. “I wanted to tell bigger stories.”
New Post-Empire Series Already in Progress
With the end of Empire looming, Hamri has big plans to expand her role in the entertainment business — and to help others like her find their way.
“I’m extremely passionate about diversity and women working in entertainment,” she says. “I really do believe if you’re looking for the best people, no holds barred, you will create a diverse roster. Benefiting from different points of view only makes our world and entertainment richer and more nuanced.”
Drawing on her international roots, Hamri is developing a new show based on the French series Quadras, which ran on Belgian and French TV. Hamri’s American adaptation is titled Let’s Spend the Night Together and follows the shenanigans of a wedding celebration.
While it remains to be seen whether this adaptation will be a new Empire-size hit, the series will no doubt reflect Sanaa Hamri’s unique insider-outsider perspective.
