Colman Domingo, Paul Tazewell, Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, and More Make Native Son 101 List

Native Son, the leading organization championing Black queer men, has announced its annual year-end Native Son 101 List Class of 2025, celebrating a powerful collective of creatives, media executives, designers, stylists, actors, authors, creators, founders, thinkers, and artists who transformed culture.

Now in its sixth year, the Native Son 101 List honors the leaders, innovators, and mavericks who have achieved landmark firsts, expanded representation, and broke barriers across politics, media, fashion, literature, film, television, business, public health, and the arts over the last year.

Among the theatre creatives honored are actor Colman Domingo, actor Jeremy Pope, actor Layton Williams, Costume Designer Paul Tazewell, playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, playwright Jordan E. Cooper, and Geffen Playhouse Artistic Director Tarell Alvin McCraney.

Conceived and curated by Native Son Founder Emil Wilbekin, this year’s class features visionary social justice advocates, award-winning performers and creatives, global tastemakers, cultural producers, and community builders. 

The 2025 list includes: two-time Academy Award nominee Colman Domingo; globally influential DJ and producer Kaytranada; Golden Globe and Emmy Award-winning director Anthony M. Hemingway; author and scholar Ahmad Greene-Hayes; R&B star Khalid; celebrated visual artist Derrick Adams; 2025 Pulitzer & Tony Award-winning playwright (Purpose) Branden Jacobs-Jenkins; journalist, anchor and host of The Don Lemon Show, Don Lemon; Oscar and Tony Award-winning Costume Designer Paul Tazewell; GRAMMY-nominated R&B breakout sensation Destin Conrad; Emmy Award-winning actor (Severance, Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning) Tramell Tillman; and Brazilian tennis star Joao Lucas Reis da Silva, the first active men’s professional tennis player to publicly come out as gay.

Other honorees include political leaders like Chi Ossé, architect of the landmark FARE Act; Preston Mitchum, one of the nation’s most influential LGBTQ+ policy voices; directors and cultural storytellers such as Justin Simien, Dewayne Perkins, and Deondray & Quincy Gossfield; and creatives like Sean Bankhead, Justin French, Jarvis Boyland, Jason Bolden, and Antoine Gregory, whose artistic contributions shaped the year’s cultural landscape.

“2025 has been a year where our community has been tested in unprecedented ways,” said Wilbekin. “We witnessed aggressive roll backs of DEI programs, erasing LGBTQ+ protections and policies - legislating against the very existence of queer and trans people. And yet - in the face of all of this - this community continued to rise. They created art. They led movements. They built-up institutions. They fully stepped into power. They used their voices and platforms to protect our stories, our culture, our humanity, and our history. The leaders on this year’s 101 List did not shrink. They pushed harder. They refused to be erased. They demonstrated that our brilliance is not conditional, our resilience is not optional, and our joy is an act of political resistance. This year’s list is a testament to our courage, creativity, and collective legacy.”

Created in 2020 at the height of the Covid-19 global health crisis and racial justice uprising, the Native Son 101 List originated as a cultural archive celebrating Black queer men across generations whose professional and creative contributions shaped the world. The list, published on nativeson.us, includes 101 Black queer men across a range of fields and remains a cornerstone of Native Son’s mission of amplifying the communities’ voice and visibility.