Tonya Lewis Lee
Producer, Writer, Entrepreneur & Women’s Health Advocate
Tonya Lewis Lee
Producer, Writer, Entrepreneur & Women’s Health Advocate
Biography
Tonya Lewis Lee is an award-winning filmmaker, author, entrepreneur, and women's health activist whose work explores the personal impact of social justice issues. Through her documentaries and books, she has reached tens of millions with vital health and wellness messages. Her feature-length documentary Aftershock (Hulu), which she co-directed and co-produced, examines the United States' maternal mortality crisis and earned a 2024 DuPont-Columbia Award, a 2023 Peabody Award, a 2023 Emmy nomination, and a 2022 Sundance Special Jury Impact for Change Award.
Tonya served as Executive Producer on Netflix's episodic series She's Gotta Have It, produced Miracle's Boys (Nickelodeon), based on the Jacqueline Woodson novel, wrote and produced The Watsons Go To Birmingham (Amazon), and produced Monster (Netflix), which premiered at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival. She is president of her production company, Madstone Company Inc. Expanding her producing work to the stage, Tonya has produced Broadway works including A Wonderful World: The Louis Armstrong Musical (Studio 54, 2024–2025), developed in association with Roundabout Theatre Company.
An accomplished author, Tonya has co-written three children's books with her husband Spike Lee— Please, Baby, Please; Please, Puppy, Please; and Giant Steps to Change the World—which have sold over one million copies. She also co-authored the adult fiction novel The Gotham Diaries (Hyperion) with Crystal McCrary Anthony, which was praised by Publisher's Weekly as "vicious," "funny," and "juicy." She has also penned guest editorials for prestigious media outlets including The Hollywood Reporter.
A committed women's health advocate, Tonya served as a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Minority Health (2007–2013), is a Board Emeritus member of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and served on the Board of Trustees for the March of Dimes (2019–2025). She was named to the 2023 Forbes 50 Over 50 list. As an entrepreneur, she founded Movita Organics, an organic vitamin supplement company promoting women's health and wellness for over a decade.
Tonya frequently shares her expertise on women's health, healthcare inequalities, and social justice through appearances on ABC News, CBS Mornings, The View, NBC News, NPR, The Steve Harvey Morning Show, and The Breakfast Club. She has addressed audiences of up to 10,000 in person and virtually for leading organizations including Planned Parenthood Federation of America, The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Harvard University, Yale University, Columbia Journalism School, Walmart, and Blue Cross Blue Shield.
A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and the University of Virginia School of Law, Tonya is a member of the Writers Guild of America, the Producers Guild of America, and the Television Academy. She is happily married, is the mother of two adult children, and lives in New York.
Speaker Videos
Impact of Mentoring and Youth Support
Speech Topics
Health: Closing the Gap on Health Disparities in the United States
Through her work with the Office of Minority Health, Tonya Lewis Lee has spoken across the country about reducing US infant mortality rates, specifically focusing on the disparity between the rates at which black babies die versus white babies – a two to one ratio. Lewis Lee discusses raising awareness around the issue of health disparities in the United States. She explores such questions as: What are the causes? What can we do to bring down these staggering rates?
Creativity: Trusting In the Creative Process
Tonya Lewis Lee left a legal career and went on to become a television producer, co-author of several children’s books, and author of an adult novel. Making the transition from a standard practice to embracing a full, fun, creative life can be scary but it has its rewards. Lewis Lee will share her guiding principles, her “up” moments and her “down” moments, as she made her own transition and continues to push the boundaries.
Activism: Showing Up Is the First Step
When called upon by the Office of Minority Health (OMH) in 2007, Tonya Lewis Lee took that first step toward raising awareness on an issue that became a passion for her and the team of people she worked with. Through a Pre-conception Peer Education Training program, Lewis Lee and OMH have fueled a movement about winning back the civil right to a healthy life. In this discussion she talks about how she and OMH set out to create a program for college students nationwide, sharing the importance of making healthy lifestyle choices for their own sake and for the sake of future generations.
I Sit Where I Want: The Legacy of Brown v. the Board of Education
In the presentation of the documentary film I Sit Where I Want, Tonya Lewis Lee discusses the process of engaging Buffalo, New York, high school students in a conversation about race, segregation, integration, and what it all means to their lives. Through the eyes of nearly a dozen students of different ethnic backgrounds, the film takes a journey to understand why these kids at a racially mixed school segregate at lunchtime in the cafeteria. It is the age-old question: Why are all the black kids sitting together in the cafeteria? At first glance the answers may seem simple, but as we get to know the students and their environments we come to realize that the issues of why people choose to self segregate can be more complex than we initially thought. Whatever the reasons, the world is a better place if we face our fears, mix it up and try something new. The students in the film come away from their experience understanding the importance of becoming aware of their actions and with a feeling that cross-cultural exchange makes for a better, more productive world.
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