Jenny Murray

{{short description|American actress and filmmaker}}

{{About-distinguish|the American actress and filmmaker|Jenn Murray|Jenni Murray}}

Jennifer Elizabeth Murray{{cite web |title=The Team |url=https://www.lassandinistas.com/the-team |access-date=May 24, 2025 |website=¡Las Sandinistas!}}{{cite web|url=https://vimeo.com/ondemand/lassandinistasenglish|title=Jennifer Elizabeth Murray on Vimeo: "¡Las Sandinistas! English Version"|website=Vimeo|access-date=May 25, 2025}}{{cite web|url=https://x.com/jen_m_1|title=Jenny Murray (@Jen_M_1) / X|website=X|access-date=May 25, 2025}} is an American actress and filmmaker. She has played lead roles in music videos for Vampire Weekend{{cite web |last=Norris |first=John |title=Vampire Weekend Looking More True To Their Name In 'Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa' Video |website=MTV |url=http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1591098/20080717/vampire_weekend.jhtml |access-date=May 28, 2025 |date=July 17, 2008|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20080915070258/http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1591098/20080717/vampire_weekend.jhtml|archive-date= September 15, 2008}}{{cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wHl9qRsMzw&list=PLlRlZjJSdPanUNwEi61fMQro3pyDCIa7w&index=4|title=Vampire Weekend - Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa|publisher=YouTube|access-date=May 28, 2025}}{{Cite web |url=http://www.spinner.ca/2010/02/19/vampire-weekend-giving-up-the-gun-video/ |title=Vampire Weekend, 'Giving up the Gun' -- Video Premiere - Spinner |access-date=May 28, 2025 |archive-date=February 22, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100222084700/http://www.spinner.ca/2010/02/19/vampire-weekend-giving-up-the-gun-video |url-status=dead }}{{cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bccKotFwzoY&list=PLlRlZjJSdPanUNwEi61fMQro3pyDCIa7w&index=8|title=Vampire Weekend - 'Giving Up The Gun' (Official Music Video)|publisher=YouTube|access-date=May 28, 2025}} and in short films (some of which she also directed), and directed, edited, and produced ¡Las Sandinistas! (2018){{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6153336/?ref_=nm_knf_t_1|title=Las Sandinistas!|website=IMDb|access-date=June 1, 2025}}, a documentary about women who lead combat and implemented social reforms in Nicaragua during the 1979 Sandinista Revolution and the subsequent Contra War in the 1980s.{{cite web|url=https://www.lassandinistas.com|title=¡Las Sandinistas!|website=¡Las Sandinistas!|access-date=May 24, 2025}}{{cite web|url=https://itvs.org/blog/jenny-murray-amplifies-the-untold-stories-of-the-women-in-the-sandinistas-revolution|title=Jenny Murray Amplifies the Untold Stories of the Women in the Sandinistas Revolution|website=ITVS|access-date=May 25, 2025}}{{cite web|url=https://itvs.org/films/las-sandinistas/|title=¡Las Sandinistas!|website=ITVS|access-date=May 25, 2025}}

Biography

Murray is 'an Irish girl from Chicago,' as she put it herself.{{cite web|url=https://www.uctv.tv/shows/Las-Sandinistas-Director-Jenny-Murray-35764|title=¡Las Sandinistas! Director Jenny Murray|website=University of California Television|access-date=May 25, 2025}}{{cite web|url=https://www.carseywolf.ucsb.edu/pollock-events/las-sandinistas|title=¡Las Sandinistas!|website=Carsey-Wolf Center at UC Santa Barbara|access-date=May 25, 2025}}{{cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wr6ivr63m5M|title=¡Las Sandinistas! Director Jenny Murray|publisher=YouTube|access-date=May 24, 2025}} Before her film career, she was working as a licensed associate on Watermill's stock trading desk in New York.

She has played the lead roles in Vampire Weekend music videos Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa (2008) and Giving Up the Gun (2010), respectively as a goth girl seeking to convert her boyfriend (Vampire Weekend singer Ezra Koenig) into a goth boy, and a tennis player winning an indoor tournament against eccentric tennis players including ultimately herself.

In 2011 and 2013, she played lead roles in two short films, Morning Routine and Side Effects May Include: Time Travel, respectively as Abby who after a one-night stand won't leave her lover's home,{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1853615/?ref_=nm_flmg_job_3_cdt_t_9|title=Morning Routine|website=IMDb|access-date=May 29, 2025}} and Linda who travels back in time to prevent the relationship with her husband, and discovers that her husband is doing exactly the same.{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3314448/?ref_=nm_flmg_job_3_cdt_t_8|title=Side Effects May Include: Time Travel|website=IMDb|access-date=May 29, 2025}}

She wrote, directed and co-produced Last Chance, Bonne Chance (2013), a short film in which she played Anna, one of the two lead roles. The other lead role was Abby, played by Zonia Pelensky. The film tells the story of two young women who want to escape their lives in New York and to accomplish that commit a crime.{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3094972/?ref_=nm_flmg_job_4_cdt_t_3|title=Last Chance, Bonne Chance|website=IMDb|access-date=May 29, 2025}}

She wrote, directed, edited and produced The Night to Make Believe (2014), a short drama in which she played the lead role of Mary.{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3560474/?ref_=nm_flmg_job_4_cdt_t_2|title=The Night to Make Believe|website=IMDb|access-date=May 29, 2025}}

In 6-minute Mom (2014), she played Jamie, one of the lead roles. The short drama is about when you find out that the person who is closest to you appears to be a stranger.{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3752324/?ref_=nm_flmg_job_3_cdt_t_5|title=6-minute Mom|website=IMDb|access-date=May 29, 2025}} In Take It Easy (2014), a short drama in which a family goes out for dinner but cannot decide who will pay the check, she appears as Brynn.{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3425494/?ref_=nm_flmg_job_3_cdt_t_4|title=Take It Easy|website=IMDb|access-date=May 29, 2025}} She plays the role of the title person in short comedy This Is Mary (2014), a woman who finds a way to feel unique in the world.{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3595828/?ref_=nm_flmg_job_3_cdt_t_3|title=This Is Mary|website=IMDb|access-date=May 29, 2025}} In short fantasy film In Through the Night (2015), Murray plays the lead role Ava, a woman who is haunted by the past and ends up in a world of memories and ghosts, and narrates the story.{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4297542/?ref_=nm_flmg_job_3_cdt_t_2|title=In Through the Night|website=IMDb|access-date=May 29, 2025}} In short drama Catherine (2017), she played the lead role, a woman who assumes the identity of a stranger to dispel discontent.{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6802392/?ref_=nm_flmg_job_3_cdt_t_1|title=Catherine|website=IMDb|access-date=May 29, 2025}}

Murray has graduated from Columbia University in New York in film, Latin American history, and photography.

In 2018 she released her first feature documentary film, ¡Las Sandinistas!, about women who lead combat and implemented social reforms in Nicaragua in the Sandinista Revolution, 1979, and the subsequent Contra war in the 1980s, which saw them having to fight again for equality within and under the Sandinista government. Murray wrote, directed, edited and produced the documentary, spending several years researching, interviewing and shooting.{{cite web|url=https://nyunews.com/2018/03/18/03-19-theme-sandinistas/|title=Sandinistas — Lost Lives and Preserved Legacies|website=Washington Square News|access-date=May 29, 2025}} The film has been screened at a number of venues and has won several awards. Murray has spoken to audiences about the film in many places across the world.

She plays Maggie, one of the lead roles in short drama Portrait: Wedding, recently completed.{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4322640/?ref_=nm_flmg_job_3_unrel_t_1|title=Portait: Wedding|website=IMDb|access-date=May 29, 2025}} In Red, a thriller currently in post-production, she plays the lead role of Paulette, a psychiatric patient who has fled into the wild and found shelter in a remote cabin with a mysterious man.{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2370684/?ref_=nm_flmg_job_3_unrel_t_2|title=Red|website=IMDb|access-date=May 29, 2025}}

In recent years, Murray has also worked as a researcher on the films and television projects of other writers and directors, usually co-writing scripts for historical or political dramas or biographies.

References

{{Reflist}}

Further reading

  • {{cite web|url=https://www.newmexicopbs.org/productions/newmexicoinfocus/sandinistas|title="¡Las Sandinistas!" Filmmaker Jenny Murray - New Mexico PBS|website=NMPBS|access-date=May 25, 2025}}
  • {{cite web|url=https://forthright.media/2018/04/18/jenny-murray-las-sandinistas|title=Jenny Murray – ¡Las Sandinistas!|website=Forthright Radio|access-date=May 25, 2025}}
  • {{cite web|url=https://www.kzyx.org/program-showcase/2018-04-18/jenny-murray-las-sandinistas|title=Jenny Murray - ¡Las Sandinistas!|website=KZYX|access-date=May 25, 2025}}
  • {{cite web|url=https://trustmovies.blogspot.com/2018/11/las-sandinistas-jenny-murrays-stirring.html|title=¡Las Sandinistas!|website=Trust Movies|access-date=May 25, 2025}}
  • {{cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXMi_DNGS3c|title=Filmmaker Jenny Murray of ¡Las Sandinistas!|publisher=YouTube|access-date=May 25, 2025}}
  • {{cite web|url=https://parkschool.net/the-latest/director-jenny-murray-discusses-feature-documentary-film-las-sandinistas|title=Director Jenny Murray Discusses Feature Documentary Film ¡Las Sandinistas!|website=The Parkschool of Baltimore|access-date=May 25, 2025}}
  • {{cite web|url=https://www.hammertonail.com/interviews/las-sandinistas-interview/|title=A Conversation with Jenny Murray (¡LAS SANDINISTAS!)|website=Hammer to Nail|access-date=May 25, 2025}}
  • {{cite web|url=https://www.instagram.com/p/BvCPcFLgqvk/?hl=nl|title=worldchannel on Instagram: "Meet Jenny Murray, the #femalefilmmaker behind the new ..."|website=Instagram|access-date=May 25, 2025}}
  • {{cite web|url=https://jpinyu.com/2024/11/05/who-do-we-remembera-review-of-jenny-murrays-las-sandinistas-2018|title=Who Do We Remember? Jenny Murray’s ¡Las Sandinistas! (2018)|website=Journal of Political Inquiry|access-date=May 25, 2025}}