Hidden Figures is a 2016 American biographical drama film directed by Theodore Melfi and written by Melfi and Allison Schroeder, based on the non-fiction book of the same name by Margot Lee Shetterly. The film stars Taraji P. Henson as Katherine Johnson, a mathematician who worked for NASA during the Space Race. The film also stars Octavia Spencer and Janelle Monáe as Johnson’s colleagues, Dorothy Vaughan and Mary Jackson, respectively.

The story follows the three African-American women who helped John Glenn become the first American to orbit the Earth, and their subsequent involvement in the Space Race. Principal photography began …