film Beat Street for Orion Pictures. Lathan directed dramas for public television's Great Performances, American Playhouse and The American Short Story. For PBS, he directed Alvin Ailey: Memories & Visions and other dance specials featuring the Martha Graham Company, Mikhail Baryshnikov and Agnes de Mille. He directed three seasons of the popular PBS music series, SOUL!, and he was one of the first directors of Sesame Street. In 1989, Lathan partnered with Russell Simmons to create the stand-up comedy franchise Def Comedy Jam on HBO. This series ran for 8 seasons and showcased many of today's popular television & movie stars. Lathan also received a Peabody Award for the series Def Poetry on HBO. That same year, Lathan co-produced Def Poetry Jam on Broadway, which won a Tony Award for best special theatrical event and has toured both domestically and internationally. In 2006, Lathan co-created Run's House, a five-season reality series for MTV that spawned a spinoff series, Daddy's Girls. He also co-executive produced Running Russell Simmons, an eight-part series for Oxygen. In 2012, he executive produced and directed The Ruckus, a stand-up series for Comedy Central. In 2008, Lathan was the creator and executive producer of Brave New Voices, a seven-part docu-reality series for HBO. As a follow up in 2009, Lathan staged and directed An Evening of Poetry, Music and Spoken Word, hosted by President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama in the White House. Lathan received both the 2003 Diversity Award and the 2013 Lifetime Achievement Award from the Caucus for Producers, Writers and Directors. He has received six NAACP Image Awards for his achievements in film and television. He was honored in 2014 by the Directors Guild of America for his directing career. In 2017, he received the Trailblazer Award from the Apollo Theater in Harlem. In 2018, he was nominated for a DGA Award for his direction of the comedy special Dave Chappelle: The Age of Spin and received a 2018 Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album for the same special and Dave Chappelle: Deep in the Heart of Texas. In 2018, Lathan directed a Netflix stand-up comedy special Mo Amer: The Vagabond and an HBO stand-up comedy special Amanda Seales: I Be Knowin'''. Lathan executive produced and directed Dave Chappelle: Equanimity'' (2017) which received a Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Variety Special (Pre-Recorded). Lathan won another Grammy Award for the 2019 Best Comedy Album for Dave