Zal Batmanglij

Zal Batmanglij is an Iranian-American filmmaker, born in 1981 in Vence, France, to Iranian parents and raised in Washington, D.C.; his younger brother is Rostam Batmanglij, a founding member of Vampire Weekend who is also openly gay. He met creative partner Brit Marling at Georgetown University, and the two went on to co-write Sound of My Voice (2011) and The East (2013), both Sundance premieres, and to co-create the Netflix series The OA (2016), a visually ambitious supernatural drama about identity, near-death experience, and alternate dimensions that developed a fiercely devoted following. Batmanglij has been open about his queer identity and has spoken about the relationship between his Iranian-American background and his filmmaking. The OA's cancellation in 2019 generated one of the most intense fan campaigns in streaming television history; Batmanglij and Marling reunited in 2023 to co-create the limited series A Murder at the End of the World.