Rwandan director Marie-Clementine Dusabejambo signs with CAA after Cannes win
Rwandan filmmaker Marie-Clementine Dusabejambo has signed with CAA, the Hollywood talent agency that represents directors and actors, Variety reported on 12 November 2026. The signing follows a strong year for her first feature as director, Ben'imana.
The film won the Camera d'Or, the prize for a first feature at the Cannes Film Festival, in 2026. It also took the Fipresci Prize, awarded by the International Federation of Film Critics, in the Un Certain Regard strand. Cannes is the first festival in the world's film calendar to name a Rwandan film to its Official Selection, the main competition lineup. Ben'imana was the first Rwandan-directed film to get there.
Rwanda then chose the film as its first-ever entry for best international feature at the 99th Academy Awards. It also earned a best international feature nomination at the Gotham Film Awards in New York. After Cannes, the film played at the Toronto International Film Festival, the BFI London Film Festival and AFI Fest in Los Angeles.
Dusabejambo was born in Kigali and grew up there. In 2008 she joined a neighbourhood collective of young filmmakers. Two years later she won a screenwriting competition run by the Tribeca Film Institute, the education arm of the Tribeca festival in New York. Her first short, Lyiza, premiered at Tribeca in 2011 and won the Bronze Tanit at the Carthage Film Festival in Tunisia the following year.
Her route to the director's chair ran through other sets too. She worked as an archivist on Why We Hate, a documentary series produced by Steven Spielberg and Alex Gibney. She also served as assistant director on Faces We Lost. The assistant director runs the day-to-day schedule on a film set.
Ben'imana took ten years to make. It is a co-production between Rwanda and Gabon, with France and Norway also involved. Co-productions split the money, paperwork and sometimes the shooting days between countries. Variety reported that 90% of the film's crew came from Rwanda's local industry.
Selling the film abroad is now in other hands. MK2, the Paris-based company, is handling international sales, which means finding distributors in countries outside the film's home. Alexander holds the rights for the United Kingdom and the United States. The film is the first title from Alexander's newly launched film division.
Dusabejambo remains represented by Paris-based attorney Beatrice Roig, of Cabinet Beatrice Roig.
For a filmmaker, the sequence is familiar in outline. A festival sells attention, sales companies sell territories, and talent agencies sell the next project. What the next project will be has not been announced.
