Hidden Figures tells the story of three African-American women who worked as computers to solve problems for engineers and others at NASA. For the first years of their careers, the workplace was segregated and women were kept in the background as human computers. Author Margot Lee Shetterly's father was a research scientist at NASA who worked with many of the book's main characters. The book explains how these three historical women overcame discrimination and racial segregation to become three American achievers in mathematics, scientific and engineering history. The main character, Katherine Johnson, calculated rocket trajectories for the Mercury and Apollo missions. Johnson successfully "took matters into her own hands"; by being assertive with her supervisor; when her mathematical abilities were recognized, Katherine Johnson was allowed into all male meetings at NASA.
Film
The book was adapted as a film of the same name, written by Theodore Melfi and Allison Schroeder, and directed by Melfi. It was released on December 25, 2016 to positive reviews from critics, and received a nomination for Best Picture at the 89th Academy Awards. It received numerous other nominations and awards. Taraji P. Henson starred as mathematician Katherine Johnson, Octavia Spencer played Dorothy Vaughan, an African-American mathematician who worked for NASA in 1949, and Janelle Monáe played Mary Jackson, the first female African-American engineer to work for NASA. The movie made 231.3 million USD. The budget of the film was 25 million USD. While the film is based on the book, author Margot Lee Shetterly agrees that there are differences between the two, and she finds that to be understandable.
For better or for worse, there is history, there is the book and then there's the movie. Timelines had to be conflated and composite characters, and for most people have already taken that as the literal fact.... You might get the indication in the movie that these were the only people doing those jobs, when in reality we know they worked in teams, and those teams had other teams. There were sections, branches, divisions, and they all went up to a director. There were so many people required to make this happen.... It would be great for people to understand that there were so many more people. Even though Katherine Johnson, in this role, was a hero, there were so many others that were required to do other kinds of tests and checks to make mission come to fruition. But I understand you can't make a movie with 300 characters. It is simply not possible.
Other adaptations
In 2016 a Young Reader's Edition was released for readers ages 8–12. A Hidden Figurespicture book was released in January 2018. The book was co-written by Margot Lee Shetterly for children from four to eight years of age.
