Biography
Since July 2015 Actor / Filmmaker / Activist Matthew Cooke's social justice and advocacy commentaries have been viewed over 100 million times on FaceBook - shared and promoted by the ACLU, World Star Hip Hop, Bernie Sanders, Cornel West, Susan Sarandon, Julian Lennon, DL Hughley, Adrian Grenier, RYOT.org, FilmingCops.org, The Anti-Media, The Free Thought Project, and many more.
In 2016 the Bernie Sanders Presidential campaign engaged Cooke to create endorsement videos with Sanders, Mark Ruffalo, Rosario Dawson, Danny DeVito and many more.
For his social activism Cooke's been invited to speak at NYU, University of Texas, TEDx in Vienna, and was honored to join Sankofa (Harry Belafonte's organization of artists for social change).
Cooke got his start in non fiction as the Producer- Editor of "Deliver Us From Evil" which earned the Academy Award Nomination for Best Documentary film, made over 100 critics "best of" lists and is one of Rotten Tomatoes top 100 best reviewed films of all time.
In 2010 Cooke was Producer-Editor for the critically acclaimed HBO Documentary "Teenage Paparazzo" featuring Adrian Grenier, Matt Damon, Whoopie Goldberg, Alec Baldwin, Rosie O'Donnell...
In 2013 Cooke wrote, directed, and narrated "How To Make Money Selling Drugs" featuring Eminem, 50 Cent, Susan Sarandon, Woody Harrelson and David Simon (creator of HBO's The Wire).
DRUGS was distributed by Robert DeNiro's Tribeca Film where it shot to #1 on iTunes and Amazon Prime for over 6 weeks. DRUGS won the audience award at every festival it screened and earned the International Documentary Associations "Best Writing Award" for 2013.
Cooke's credits on "How to Make Money Selling Drugs" also include: editor, cinematographer, motion graphics designer and art director.
In 2014 Cooke and Emmy Award Winning Producer Steve DeVore began "Survivors Guide to Prison" (executive produced by Susan Sarandon) featuring The Prophets of Rage: Tom Morello (Rage Against the Machine), Chuck D (Public Enemy), B-Real (Cypress Hill), RZA, Q Tip (Tribe Called Quest), Quincy Jones, Patricia Arquette, Deepak Chopra, Russell Simmons, Brandon Boyd (Incubus), Busta Rhymes, Ice T, Danny Glover, Cynthia Nixon, Warren G and many more. Produced by David and Christina Arquette and Gina Belafonte.
In fiction, Cooke got his start acting and directing short films and comedy sketches for Fuel TV. In 2007 Cooke wrote the screenplay sequel to "The Falcon and the Snowman" which was assigned to A-list agents at ICM.
In 2015 Cooke began developing the science fiction feature Rapid Eye Movement and Note To Self(ish), Cooke's narrative feature film debut as writer-director-actor.
