What is Saul Williams's Net Worth?
Saul Williams is an American rapper, singer-songwriter, musician, poet, actor, and filmmaker who has a net worth of $500 thousand. Known for blending poetry with alternative hip-hop, Saul Williams has released such albums as "Amethyst Rock Star," "The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of NiggyTardust!," and "Saul Williams Meets Carlos Niño & Friends at Treepeople." As an actor, he starred in the films "Slam," "Today," and "Akilla's Escape" and the Broadway jukebox musical "Holler If Ya Hear Me," and as a filmmaker he wrote and co-directed the Afrofuturist musical film "Neptune Frost."
Early Life and Education
Saul Williams was born on February 29, 1972 in Newburgh, New York as the youngest of three siblings. After attending Newburgh Free Academy, he went to Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia, from which he graduated with his BA in acting and philosophy. Williams subsequently attended graduate school at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, where he earned his MFA. From 1988 to 1989, he was an exchange student in Brazil.
Poetry and Music
While studying at NYU, Williams became involved in the New York City café poetry scene. By the mid-1990s, he was an open mic poet, and in 1996 he won a poetry slam at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe. Also that year, Williams competed in the National Poetry Slam in Portland, Oregon, a journey that was chronicled in the documentary film "SlamNation." Around this time, Williams was branching out into the music world, performing with such artists as Nas, Erykah Badu, De La Soul, and KRS-One. In 2001, he released his debut solo studio album, "Amethyst Rock Star." Williams followed that with the EP "Not in My Name" in 2003 and an acclaimed self-titled album in 2004. In both 2005 and 2006, he went on tour supporting the rock band Nine Inch Nails. That band's frontman, Trent Reznor, produced Williams's third solo studio album, "The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of NiggyTardust!," which came out in 2007.
Williams's fourth solo music album, "Volcanic Sunlight," was released in late 2011. He went on to release the albums "MartyrLoserKing" in 2016 and "Encrypted & Vulnerable" in 2019. In 2022, he released "Unanimous Goldmine," the original soundtrack album to his film "Neptune Frost." As a writer and poet, Williams has written poetry collections and been published in Esquire, African Voices, the New York Times, and Bomb Magazine, among other publications. He has also toured and lectured around the world, often at colleges and universities. In early 2009, Williams released the spoken word poetry album "NGH WHT," a reading of his 2006 poetry book "The Dead Emcee Scrolls." The album features the Arditti Quartet. For his 2025 spoken word poetry album, "Saul Williams Meets Carlos Niño & Friends at Treepeople," Williams earned a Grammy Award nomination.
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Acting and Filmmaking
Williams made his major acting debut as the star of the 1998 independent drama film "Slam," playing a young aspiring poet and rapper from a troubled neighborhood in Washington, DC. The film won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival and the Caméra D'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. Williams later had a supporting role in the 2001 science-fiction film "K-PAX," starring Kevin Spacey and Jeff Bridges. In 2005, he played a Vietnam War veteran in the HBO television film "Lackawanna Blues," based on the play by Ruben Santiago-Hudson. Williams later starred as the lead character, Satché, in the French-Senegalese film "Today," which premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival in 2012. In 2014, he made his Broadway debut as the star of the new jukebox musical "Holler If Ya Hear Me," featuring the music of Tupac Shakur.
In 2017, Williams played Oberon in Casey Wilder Mott's modern-day adaptation of Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream." In 2020, he starred as the titular character in the drama "Akilla's Escape," which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. For his performance, Williams received a Canadian Screen Award nomination for Best Actor. In 2021, he made his feature directorial debut with the Afrofuturist musical "Neptune Frost," which he co-directed with Anisia Uzeyman and also wrote. The film focuses on the relationship between an intersex hacker and a coltan miner in post-civil war Burundi. Returning to acting, Williams appeared in Zoë Kravitz's 2024 psychological thriller "Blink Twice" and Ryan Coogler's 2025 period vampire film "Sinners," playing pastor Jedidiah Moore in the latter.
Personal Life
Williams identifies as queer. He is also a vegan. Williams previously dated visual artist and professor Marcia Jones, dancer and choreographer Fatima Robinson, and actress Persia White. He had a son with Robinson and was briefly married to White. Williams later married Rwandan actress, playwright, and filmmaker Anisia Uzeyman.
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