MADU Nominated For Two EMMY® Awards

Critically Acclaimed Disney Original Feature-Length Documentary, Madu, Is Nominated For Two EMMY® Awards.

The film about our student Anthony Madu was released on Disney+ in March 2024.  

We are thrilled to share that the critically acclaimed Disney Original feature-length documentary MADU has been honoured with two Emmy® nominations: Outstanding Direction (Documentary) and Outstanding Arts and Culture Documentary. The Awards will take place on Thursday 26 June in New York. The prestigious recognition of the two Emmy® nominations highlights the film’s exceptional storytelling and its profound exploration of the cultural impact of 12-year-old Nigerian ballet dancer Anthony Madu’s journey as he leaves his community on the outskirts of Lagos to pursue a ballet career, training at Elmhurst Ballet School in Birmingham.  

From Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Matt Ogens (Audible) and award-winning filmmaker Kachi Benson (Daughters of Chibok), the Disney Original feature-length documentary received a successful world premiere last year, opening the Santa Barbara International Film Festival in February 2024, before being released on Disney+ in March 2024. The film is currently available to stream on Disney+.  

MADU was a nominee in the ‘Best TV Feature Documentary’ category at the International Documentary Association Awards 2024, as well as a nominee in the ‘Best Documentary’ category of the NAMIC Vision Awards 2025.  

MADU captures Anthony’s story after being discovered through a viral 44-second video that was posted online in 2020 and viewed over 16 million times. Having grown up in an isolated community outside of Lagos and with almost no formal training, viewers get a close look at Anthony’s journey after being awarded a scholarship to Elmhurst Ballet School, one of the most prestigious ballet schools in the UK. Anthony comes from a community with limited opportunities, making this a unique chance of a lifetime to pursue his dream. By engaging the audience in Lagos’s culture and fascinating surroundings, Ogens and Benson use their unique perspectives to bring the film to life. Featuring candid realism and stunning visuals, the film immersesviewers into Anthony’s world and examines his journey in profoundly inspiring ways. 

 Jessica Ward, Principal of Elmhurst Ballet School said of the two Emmy® Award nominations,“Everyone at Elmhurst Ballet School is immensely proud that MADU has garnered this critical acclaim and that Anthony’s incredible journey continues to be recognised and respected. 

We are thrilled to send our congratulations to Directors Matt Ogens and Kachi Benson on these nominations, for their incredible work on MADU. Their visionary direction and remarkable storytelling have earned them these prestigious recognitions. The nominations also mark a historic milestone – Kachi is the first Nigerian documentary filmmaker to be nominated for Outstanding Direction,which sets an inspiring precedent for future Nigerian filmmakers.  

MADU is a journey of discovery, growth, belonging and acceptance, and enabling Anthony’s voice to be heard and telling his extraordinary story has been in equal parts captivating, emotional, and riveting. Nearly four years after Anthony joined Elmhurst, his presence continues to brighten our school daily.” 

Anthony first attended Elmhurst Ballet School in May 2021 after the school reached out to him following the viral 44-second video of him dancing barefoot in the rain outside his Lagos home.The video resulted in vast amounts of publicity for Anthony, including major broadcasters and newspapers all over the world. In May 2021, Anthony visited and lived at Elmhurst for three days, to experience life as a full-time boarding student at the school. During the three days, Anthony experienced dance and academic classes and was observed in ballet classes by the artistic team. At the end of his three-day stay, Anthony was offered a full-time place at the school. Anthony joined the school on a full bursary scholarship in September 2021 and boards full-time. 

Filming of MADU at Elmhurst Ballet School began in September 2021 as Anthony settled into boarding, dance training, and academic classes. Over the course of the year, filming covered all aspects of Anthony’s life at Elmhurst, from artistic to academic classes, from boarding to the Health and Wellbeing. Filming also included Anthony’s UK life away from the school: his downtime in Birmingham; weekends and holidays with guardians and friends; and travelling home to Nigeria during school holidays.

Matt Ogens is known for capturing authentic human stories through an evocative visual and narrative aesthetic. Matt’s Netflix Original Audible was nominated for an Oscar® in 2022, an immersive coming-of-age documentary told from the perspective of deaf high school students and communicated through sign language. His debut documentary, Confessions of a Superhero, garnered critical acclaim and a devoted following. He subsequently earned a Primetime Emmy® Award for ESPN’s 30 for 30: From Harlem with Love. Kachi Benson is an award-winning filmmaker whose work primarily focuses on social impact storytelling. He became the first Nigerian to use VR for a narrative film when he released In Bakassi in 2017, a virtual experience of life in one of the largest IDP (Internally Displaced Person) Camps in Northeast Nigeria. In 2019, Kachi’s Daughters of Chibok made history when it won the Venice Lion for Best Immersive Story at the Venice Film Festival, making him the first African to win the prize. 

MADU is available to stream on Disney+: Watch Madu | Disney+ (disneyplus.com)