Regina King is accustomed to all eyes being on her. From her days as a child star on the hit 1980s sitcom 227 to her Academy Award–winning performance in If Beale Street Could Talk, her talent and charisma have earned her legions of fans and endless accolades. So why would an acclaimed actress, director, and producer decide to take a detour from the red carpet to the vineyard and face a new set of critics—wine lovers?
In August, King officially entered the wine industry with the debut of MianU, whose name is pronounced “me and you.” “I’m elated to share MianU with the world to celebrate the special ‘me and you’ moments with those who are near and dear to us,” she says. “MianU is inspired by my son Ian’s passion for art, flavor, and connection. It embodies the love he holds for those around him.”
King’s vivid memory of Ian, who died in 2022, introducing her to orange wine inspired the MianU 2024 style. A beguiling amber hue, it’s crafted with 75% Gewürztraminer and 25% Chardonnay sourced from two organic vineyards in Mendocino County, California: McFadden Farm provided the former and Hawkeye Ranch the latter. Aged in neutral oak for six months, the wine is unfined and unfiltered, with minimal sulfites. “The beauty of orange wine is that it does have more body. It is a little more complex than your average white wine,” says King, noting that the Chardonnay “smooths out” the “floral funk” of the Gewürztraminer.
“It’s so important to me that this is Ian-approved,” she adds. “It has to be something that I know he’d be like, ‘OK, this is us, this is what we’re doing.’ I needed to know that. I needed to feel a bit of that feeling that I felt the first time he had me taste orange wine—that ‘ooh.’”
Although the decision to create MianU came from the heart, King confesses that making the transition from wine lover to vintner required her to take a deep dive into the myriad aspects of production: “Before becoming a vintner, I was just drinking wine for the taste or [because] it paired well with something. But understanding the alchemy, the chemistry, how it affects my body, how it affects the Earth, has been really fascinating and exciting,” she says.
I tasted MianU at a small, casual al fresco gathering hosted by King at The Little Nell during the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen, Colorado. It’s certainly a bold move to enter the wine world with an orange wine, and I was impressed by the creativity of the blend, which was refreshing and satisfying on a hot summer day. Meanwhile, Ian’s presence was felt as King shared stories of her creative son and his deep love for food, wine, and bringing people together. King describes that Aspen gathering as “celebratory and indicative of everything that Ian is . . . wanting always to make everything a moment, you know, because you never know what’s to come, you never know.”
The inaugural vintage of MianU was a resounding success, selling out completely. So what’s next? “The process of making the next vintage is like making a film: You gotta wait. The grapes have been picked, the film has been shot, but we still have to edit. . . . There are a lot of little steps along the way,” explains King.
I’m eagerly staying tuned for MianU’s next release, knowing that King plans to “keep it small, keep it special”—and keep it Ian. Visit mianuwines.com for more information.
Wanda Mann is a Certified Specialist
of Wine and the founder of
winewithwanda.com. Follow her on Instagram @winedinewanda.