Matthew D. Wilder - Writer/Director

Matthew Wilder has written for some of America's most respected filmmakers. For Oliver Stone, he wrote "Day of Reckoning," a large-scale thriller about the war on terror. For Renny Harlin and his Midnight Sun production company, he wrote "How to Be a Good and Useful Person," a Fight Club-esque black comedy about a cult of upscale guys who run their life by a throw of the dice. With Clive Barker he co-created the HBO series "American Heretics," a horror epic that paints a demonic alternate history of the United States. He wrote "Dizzy Up the Girl," a kaleidoscopic journey into the life and times of sixties superstar Edie Sedgwick, to be his forthcoming first feature.

Wilder also has directed at America's most distinguished theatres. He received a B.A. cum laude in literature at Yale University, then an M.F.A. in directing from UC-San Diego. Upon graduating from UCSD, Wilder was offered the unprecedented gig of directing on the mainstage of La Jolla Playhouse: Eugene O'Neill's "The Hairy Ape" was his first professional production. Since then, he has directed Jon Robin Baitz's "The End of the Day" at the Magic Theatre in San Francisco; Ariel Dorfman's "Death and the Maiden" at Actors Theatre of Louisville; Naomi Iizuka's "Skin," Samuel Beckett's "Krapp's Last Tape," and Sophocles' "Antigone" at Dallas Theatre Center; the premieres of Karl Gajdusek's "Malibu" and Michael McClung's "Natural Child" at Soho Rep in New York; and "The Secret History of the Lower East Side," with four playwrights and a cast of 65, on the roof of a disused Rivington Street high school for Annie Hamburger's En Garde Arts in New York. The San Diego Reader's Jeff Smith described Wilder as "already one of America's most accomplished directors."

Wilder has twice received the DramaLogue Award for Best Director; the Princess Grace-Theatreworks USA Grant for Emerging Artists; and the Dallas Critics' Circle Award for Best Production.

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