Melissa Leilani Larson, Lecturer

Originally from Hau’ula, HI, Melissa Leilani Larson is an award-winning playwright and screenwriter presently based in Provo, UT. She holds an MFA from the University of Iowa Playwrights Workshop as well as a BA in English/Creative Writing from Brigham Young University. Her plays Martyrs’ Crossing (IRAM award for Best New Play, and KCACTF Meritorious Achievement) and Lady in Waiting (winner of the Lewis National Playwriting Contest for Women) have both enjoyed multiple productions, sold-out shows, and readings. Martyrs’ Crossing was named one of the best productions of Utah Valley in 2006 and was presented at WorkShop Theater Company’s 2008 Sundays at Six reading series in New York; the play will be published in the upcoming anthology Saints on Stage. A number of Mel’s other plays have been produced as well: Jane Austen’s Persuasion; Little Happy Secrets; Standing Still Standing (Mayhew Contest Winner); The Church of St. Pinky at Katy, Texas (finalist for the Downstairs Reading Series at the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C.); Hope Falls and A Flickering. Her screen adaptation of Standing Still Standing won the 2006 LDS Film Festival feature writing award and is presently in pre-production. Mel has written, directed, and/or produced a number of short films; she wrote the independent feature The Lilac Thief and the teleplay McCabe and the Kid. Mel is a proud member of the Dramatists Guild of America.