Michael Urban | Faculty Lead, Screenwriting

Michael Urban is a graduate of the AFI Screenwriting program. His first feature film, SAVED! (co-written with Brian Dannelly), was produced by MGM/UA in 2004.

He has since completed writing assignments for several major film and television studios including Twentieth Century Fox, Sony Pictures, Warner Bros. Television, ABC Television, Lionsgate and HBO.

Mark Amato | Senior Affiliated Faculty

Mark Amato began his writing career as an assistant at Brillstein-Grey Entertainment by sending jokes to SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE. Following a short segue as Manager of Comedy Development for Sony Television, he has spent the past two decades as a professional writer-producer on half-hour comedies including SUITE LIFE ON DECK and BABY DADDY, sci-fi dramas such as MUTANT X, and animated shows like MEN IN BLACK and GHOSTBUSTERS.

For the past decade and a half, Amato segued into writing romantic comedies, starting with REVENGE OF THE BRIDESMAIDS at Freeform, which quickly followed into a prolific career writing holiday romps, including dozens of movies for Hallmark, Lifetime and Netflix as well as CBS, with such hits as KNIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS, A CHRISTMAS PROPOSAL and A KISS BEFORE CHRISTMAS reuniting Desperate Housewives stars James Denton and Teri Hatcher.

He has sold over a half-dozen original pilots throughout his career, and most recently his spec pilot, “60.40.20” won first place in the WGA diversity competition.

Alon Aranya | Affiliated Faculty

Writer and producer Alon Aranya has set up 40 scripted shows at studios and networks around the world, including RED WIDOW and BETRAYAL for ABC and HOSTAGES at CBS. He’s currently in production on YOUR HONOR, starring Bryan Cranston, at Showtime and TEHRAN, an international drama thriller from Israel.

Aranya’s company, Paper Plane Productions, is under a two-year first look deal with CBS Studios International and has helped launch their original drama slate with DISTRICT Y, an Israeli drama, and BEST SELLER BOY, an original Dutch dramedy based on a best-selling book by Mano Bouzamur. Both shows are slated for production in 2020.

George Blake Jr. | Affiliated Faculty

Marjorie David | Senior Affiliated Faculty

Marjorie David is a writer and producer with over three decades of experience. Her career began on the acclaimed cop drama HILL STREET BLUES. Since then, she has worked on twenty television series, including LAW & ORDER: SVU, 90210, SHADOWHUNTERS: THE MORTAL INSTRUMENTS and TAKEN.

David has also written TV movies for Lifetime, NBC, CBS, TNT and USA, including INTO THE BADLANDS, as well as two features, MARIA’S LOVERS and SHY PEOPLE.
Most recently, David wrote READING LOLITA IN TEHRAN, which is in post-production.

Marjorie David currently serves on the Board of Directors of the WGA West and has previously served as Vice President.

David also teaches in the Directing Discipline.

Cami Delavigne | Affiliated Faculty

Cami Delavigne is a screenwriter, TV writer, and producer. She co-wrote the Oscar^®-nominated film BLUE VALENTINE, starring Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams. Additional credits include the WGA-nominated series HOMECOMING (Amazon), THE SON (AMC), QUANTICO (ABC), NEW AMSTERDAM (NBC), KEVIN CAN F*** HIMSELF (AMC), and AMERICAN GIGOLO (Showtime), as well as original pilots for HBO and Sundance Channel.  She is currently writing an original scripted podcast for Audible.

Karen Janszen, WGA | Senior Affiliated Faculty & Senior Mentor

Karen Janszen is a Los Angeles-based writer/producer with 25+ years of experience developing and writing for film studios, streamers, cable outlets, and network television. While she has worked on thrillers, comedies, and historical epics – and done uncredited polishes on animated films – she is best known for family dramas. Janszen’s theatrical writing credits include Netflix’s RESCUED BY RUBY and Warner Bros. films DOLPHIN TALE, A WALK TO REMEMBER, and DUMA. Janszen also wrote the indies GRACIE, DIGGING TO CHINA, and THE MATCHMAKER. For television, Janszen developed the series MARS and wrote an episode of HBO’s FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON. Other television work includes pilots for original series for ABC, CBS, Munich-based Tandem. Her most recent series, EARTH ABIDES, streams on Amazon in December 2024. Janszen is a double AFI Alum: Screenwriting and AFI DWW.

Kevin Kennedy | Senior Affiliated Faculty & Senior Mentor

Kevin Kennedy is a writer and producer with diverse experience in studio and independent film, as well as both cable and network television. His principal credits include THE ASSASSINATION OF RICHARD NIXON and the TV series THE DEFENDERS, which he co-created and executive produced.

In addition to his work as a writer and producer, Kennedy helped to educate and to develop the work of scores of novelists, playwrights, and screenwriters in his capacity as founder and workshop director of the Writer’s Film Project, a film writing fellowship program sponsored by Amblin Entertainment and Universal Pictures.

Kennedy is a graduate of the English/Creative Writing program at Stanford University, after which he attended the MFA screenwriting program at the UCLA School of Film and Television.

Kennedy also teaches in the Directing and Producing Disciplines.

Shana Lloyd | Senior Affiliated Faculty & Senior Mentor

Shana Lloyd is a (recovering) actor, (sometimes) filmmaker and (mostly) writer hailing from suburban Maryland. She studied acting in New York at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. While in NYC, she worked off Broadway with many theaters, such as La Mama and NYTW. As an actor, she has shared the stage with such greats as Ed Asner and Isabella Hofmann.

Lloyd established Crisis Management Productions in May 2011, as a vehicle to produce more female-driven socially relevant content. Their debut film was the short, CRISIS.  She also has a few TV projects of her own in development, as well as with longtime collaborator and writing partner, Alison McKenzie. Their film HEAVEN DOWN HERE premiered in December 2023, starring “Hamilton”’s Krystal Joy Brown and the legendary Phylicia Rashad. Ms. Rashad was just nominated for a NAACP Image Award for the film.

One of her latest collaborations was assisting the last class of NBC’s Writers on the Verge (now NBC Launch), working with one of her mentors, Jen Grisanti. Lloyd is currently an adjunct faculty member in the screenwriting departments of the AFI Conservatory and Emerson. She has also taught classes at SOCAPA Los Angeles.

Antonio R. Macia | Senior Affiliated Faculty

Antonio, a Latinx independent filmmaker, a Blacklist writer, Spirit Award nominee, Sundance alum, FIND Screenwriting Fellow, and a proud member of WGA. He has over fifteen years of experience with five feature films (AFFLUENZA, ANNE B. REAL, HOLY ROLLERS, BLACKJACK: THE JACKIE RYAN STORY, SEVEN FACES OF JANE) to his credit. His latest short film WHAT BITCH?! can be seen on all HBO Platforms.

Blake Masters | Senior Affiliated Faculty

Blake Masters is a writer/showrunner whose credits include the Peabody-award winning drama BROTHERHOOD (which he created), FALLING WATER (which he co-created) and 2 GUNS. Among his other credits are LAW & ORDER: LA (co-creator), SNEAKY PETE (showrunner), RUBICON and HEELS. He has developed multiple times at Fox, AMC, NBC and Showtime and currently has series in development at Amazon and Netflix.

Jack Olsen | Senior Affiliated Faculty

Screenwriter Jack Olsen has worked for the past two decades on dozens of projects for Warner Bros, Paramount, Fox, Sony, Disney, Universal, MGM and others, experience that has given him a nuanced understanding of the ins and outs of studio feature script development.

In 2016, Sony released his original thriller, WHEN THE BOUGH BREAKS. More recently, he wrote and executive produced the indie psychological thriller SLEEPWALKER, which screened at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival before its release in the spring of 2017.

Lara Olsen | Affiliated Faculty

Lara Olsen is a screenwriter who got her start writing for many years in half-hour comedy before transitioning into one-hour television, landing her first show-running job on 90210 and helming the show for its final two seasons. From there, she pursued development opportunities and served as co-showrunner on CW’s REIGN for its final season. Olsen has also served as showrunner on Netflix’s FREE REIN, as co-executive producer on CBS’ swashbuckling adventure BLOOD & TREASURE, and showrunner on Netflix’s drama SPINNING OUT.

Olsen’s background also includes time on MIXOLOGY, LIFE UNEXPECTED, and Shondaland’s PRIVATE PRACTICE, among other series. With her former writing partner, Olsen wrote and produced CBS pilot NY-LON based on the original series which aired on U.K.’s Channel 4. She recently developed projects for Netflix with Fabel Entertainment, a pilot for 3000 Pictures based on Elin Hilderbrand’s bestselling novel “Summer of ’69,” and an adaption of a Korean format for WBTV. Olsen is currently hard at work rebooting BAYWATCH for FBC and Fremantle and is also developing a television adaption of the book MIRANDA IN RETROGRADE for Amazon.

Derek Santos Olson | Senior Affiliated Faculty

Derek Santos Olson is a screenwriter who has worked in both film and TV.

He wrote on the final two seasons of NBC/DirecTV’s FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS and was nominated for WGA Awards for both seasons. His other TV credits include ABC’s THE UNUSUALS and CBS’ HAWAII FIVE-O.   In film, he has sold original pitches and has done rewrite assignments in a variety of genres.

He attended Yale University and has enjoyed teaching or tutoring in one capacity or another since shortly after his graduation.

Dawn Prestwich | Affiliated Faculty

Austin Reynolds | Senior Affiliated Faculty & Senior Mentor

Austin Reynolds is a graduate of the AFI screenwriting program where his thesis script landed on The Blacklist. After graduation he worked as a director’s assistant at Amblin & DreamWorks before spending several years as a feature staff writer for Walt Disney Studios, developing and rewriting theatrical features directly for the studio. He co-wrote an upcoming THE SANDLOT feature at Fox, as well as other projects in development at Hasbro, White Horse Pictures, Anonymous Content and more. Recently, he’s been staffed in several writer’s rooms to develop or rewrite studio projects. He has been an educator at the AFI for ten years. As a Senior Affiliated Faculty member, Reynolds teaches screenwriting, producing, and is a cycle development mentor. He is a member of the Writers Guild of America West. Reynolds also teaches in the Producing Discipline.

Matty Rich | Senior Affiliated Faculty

Highly regarded as a pioneer of Black Filmmaking, Matty Rich gained major recognition in the early 90s as the 19-year-old writer/ director/ producer of his debut film STRAIGHT OUT OF BROOKLYN. The movie was critically acclaimed, going on to win the Sundance Film Festival’s Grand Jury Prize Award, an Independent Spirit Award, the NAACP Image Award and the Producer’s Guild Award.

Rich then signed a three-picture deal with Disney, where he directed the summer splash, THE INKWELL, which is now a Black film classic. Other credits include development of several television projects, including “Red Hook” as a writer/creator for Warner Bros/Fox Network, the Tupac Shakur bio project for HBO, and “Subway Scholar” with Whitney Houston for Showtime Network.

In the mid 2000’s, Rich accepted an offer from video game giant Ubisoft to serve as their Creative Director/Artistic Director for the video game, 187 Ride or Die. Then, returning to his filmmaking roots, he wrote, directed and acted in a 10-minute short film as part of his upcoming project Birth of the Black Underworld. The short film was screened at the 2023 Essence Film Festival where it won the Best Film and Audience Award and received rave reviews.

Marquita Robinson | Senior Affiliated Faculty

Marquita J. Robinson is a comedy screenwriter and producer in Los Angeles. Her writing career spans an impressive range of both critical darling “dramedies” and beloved network comedies including SURVIVOR’S REMORSE, NEW GIRL, GLOW, YOU’RE THE WORST, BLACK-ISH and the upcoming comedy HOW TO DIE ALONE— where she currently serves as co-executive producer. In her short career, Robinson has had the incredible honor of losing multiple awards: an NAACP Image Award, a WGA award, a BLACK REEL award and most recently, an Emmy^® for Outstanding Series for BLACK-ISH.

Terrie Samundra | Affiliated Faculty & Mentor

Terrie Samundra is a director and screenwriter whose debut feature film, KAALI KHUHI, was released globally by Netflix Originals in October 2020. Her many short films have screened internationally, garnering numerous accolades, and she recently wrapped the writer’s room for an undisclosed Netflix series.

Samundra is an alum of the Sundance Screenwriters Lab and the Sundance WIF Finance Lab, and is a current directing fellow of ReFrame Rise; a partnership between the Sundance Institute and Women in Film. She is a SFFILM Rainin Grant fellow for screenwriting, a Princess Grace recipient and a member of the WGAW.

A multicultural artist, Samundra grew up between a rural village in India, a small farming town in Missouri and along the coast of California. She is represented by the Gersh Agency and Circle of Confusion.

Samundra also teaches in the Producing and Screenwriting Disciplines.

Darren Stein | Affiliated Faculty

Darren Stein was raised in a celluloid family with grandparents who started a boutique Hollywood film laboratory in 1961. The prolific output of childhood films he made on his Encino cul-de-sac would go on to become the subject of his 2003 documentary PUT THE CAMERA ON ME. After graduating from NYU’s Tisch Film School, Stein co-wrote and directed SPARKLER which premiered at the Hamptons Film Festival and featured Park Overall, Freddie Prinze Jr, Veronica Cartwright and Grace Zabriskie.

Stein went on to write and direct the dark teen comedy JAWBREAKER, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and has gone on to become a cultural touchstone and cult classic. He is currently rebooting JAWBREAKER as a movie musical at Sony Pictures/Columbia.

Stein has written pilots for HBO, Freeform, The CW, ABC and E! and wrote the final installment of VC Andrews’ FLOWERS IN THE ATTIC movie series SEEDS OF YESTERDAY for Lifetime. In addition, he produced the cult horror film ALL ABOUT EVIL starring Natasha Lyonne and directed the cult teen comedy feature GBF, which premiered at the 2013 Tribeca Film Festival and is currently streaming on Peacock. Recently, he has served as a producer and guest judge on five seasons of THE BOULET BROTHERS’ DRAGULA. He has also directed several music videos and fashion films, including a Clio Award-winning piece for designer Alexander Wang.

Patricia Verducci | Affiliated Faculty

Pat wrote and directed the feature film TRUE CRIME, starting Alicia Silverstone, and has written screenplays for Touchstone Pictures, Witt-Thomas Productions, and Disney’s animation division. She has also worked as a story consultant for Disney/Pixar.

She co-produced SOMEWHERE BETWEEN, a feature documentary about four teenaged girls adopted from China, and is the co-writer of BELLA, a documentary about the modern dancer Bella Lewitzky. She served as a story consultant on Disney’s Tinkerbell franchise and has worked as a script consultant with Academy Award^® winning screenwriters and emerging writers on their film and TV projects.

Pat is a mentor at the Meryl Streep funded Writers Lab for Women and is a member of the Writer’s Guild of America.

Lauren Wells | Affiliated Faculty

Lauren Wells is a screenwriter who most recently wrote on FX’s Emmy nominated television show WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS. Prior to that, she worked in support staff roles on shows such as UNBREAKABLE KIMMY SCHMIDT, HAPPY!, LUKE CAGE, JESSICA JONES, DAREDEVIL, and ANGELYNE, among others. Her original dark comedy pilot FLAT was featured on The 2023 Next List via Coverfly and The Tracking Board.

Last year, Lauren adapted Bram Stoker’s DRACULA as a twenty-episode podcast series called MINA + LUCY’S GUIDE TO SLAYING DRACULA. Produced by Gen Z Media, the series stars Bradley Whitford and Ritchie Coster. It is available everywhere you get your podcasts, and it was nominated for an Ambie Award for Best Kids Podcast. Lauren also collaborated with Pretty Good Friends and Nina Porzucki to write an adult comedy podcast called BIRD TALK, which was a Tribeca Film Festival 2024 official fiction selection starring Michael Ian Black, Aparna Nancherla, and Maeve Higgins.

Originally from a horse farm in Central New York, Lauren studied improv and sketch comedy at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre while finishing her M.F.A in Writing and Producing for Television at LIU Brooklyn. She has a B.A. in English from Hobart + William Smith Colleges, where she focused on creative writing and poetry. Lauren’s poetry has been featured in New York Quarterly, Everyday Genius, Burner Magazine, and The Legendary.

Lauren is a member of the screenwriting faculty at the American Film Institute Conservatory, a Sundance Collab screenwriting advisor, and a TV Comedy Instructor with Writing Pad. She also offers private career and script consultations as well as consultations through Roadmap Writers. She resides in Los Angeles with her rescue dog, Mr. Feeny.

Jesse Wigutow | Senior Affiliated Faculty

Jesse Wigutow has written on films for every major studio, including 8 MILE, TRON: LEGACY, ERAGON, THE RUINS, and IT RUNS IN THE FAMILY. He has worked consistently in the studio system, adapting books like Fitzgerald’s “Tender is the Night” for Sony, Anthony Bourdain’s memoir “Kitchen Confidential” for New Line and a reboot of THE CROW for Relativity.

He is currently writing TRON 3 for Disney and a live action feature based on Thomas the Tank Engine for Mattel.

He graduated from the AFI Conservatory in 1999.

Allan Arkush | Senior Lecturer

Allan Arkush was the executive producer of the TV series HEROES and CROSSING JORDAN. His other Television Directing & Producing credits include NCIS,GET CRAZY, FAME, ALLY MCBEAL, MOONLIGHTING,LA LAW, HELLCATS, ELVIS MEETS NIXON,ST. ELSEWHERE, DEFIANCE,BRAINDEAD, WITCHES OF EAST END, SHANNON’S DEAL, CENTRAL PARK WEST, MOON OVER MIAMI and PARENTHOOD, over 400 episodes in all.

His most recent directing assignment, Netflix’s A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS: THE HOSTILE HOSPITAL episodes earned him a DGA Nomination for Best Directing of a Children’s Show.

As a lifelong film buff, Arkush’s film criticism can be found on TrailersFromHell.com, where he is a contributing Guru. He also taught Producing & Directing For TV at UCLA Graduate School.

Arkush graduated from NYU Film School and began his career working for Roger Corman’s New World Pictures in the mid-1970s. It was there that he began his career by Co-directing with Joe Dante, HOLLYWOOD BOULEVARD, for which they were paid $85. In 1979, he made The Ramones’ cult favorite ROCK ‘N’ ROLL HIGH SCHOOL, which Rolling Stone magazine named as one of the top 10 rock ‘n’ roll DVDs of all time.

Arkush resides in Los Angeles with his wife. He has 2 daughters in graduate school.

Moran Cerf | Sloan Scholar

Moran Cerf is a professor of neuroscience. Additionally, he is the Alfred P. Sloan faculty at AFI.

Prior to his academic career, professor Cerf worked as a hacker for nearly a decade, breaking into leading financial and government institutes to test and improve their security. His hacking background has led him to later pursue non-traditional ways to investigate the brain, using methods and techniques that benefit from heavy computational skills and novel research tools. Notably, he has been working with patients undergoing brain-surgery where he studies behavior, emotion, decision making and dreams – by directly recording the activity of individual neurons using electrodes implanted in the patients’ brain.

He is a multiple-times national story-telling champion (‘The Moth’), and his public talks at TED, TEDx, Google Zeitgeist, PopTech, DLD and others have received millions of views and a large following. In addition to his academic career, professor Cerf is a science consultant for various Hollywood films and TV shows. Recently, he was named one of the “40 leading professors below 40”.

Most importantly, he is right handed.

Barry Sabath | Senior Lecturer

Holding an MA and PhD in Cinema Studies from New York University, Sabath also offers two decades of feature film development experience as both a studio executive and producer.

A Vice President of Production at Columbia Pictures, he also ran the film division of Robin Williams’ Blue Wolf Productions, whose productions include MRS. DOUBTFIRE. At Twentieth Century Fox, he was Senior Vice

President of Production for Paul Schiff Productions, where he oversaw MY COUSIN VINNY and was co-producer on GHOST IN THE MACHINE and PCU.

Sabath is a recipient of the French Chevalier medal for his contribution to French film culture, an international mentor for the Korean Film Council’s Filmmakers’ Development Labs, a participant in labs and panels at the Busan International Film Festival and the Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival, and a consultant for the newly launched Hainan Island International Film Festival in China.

Sabath taught film history and theory at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Illinois State University, and is the co-author of ERNST LUBITSCH: A GUIDE TO REFERENCES AND RESOURCES.

Cathy Wischner-Sola | Senior Affiliated Faculty

Wischner-Sola is an award-winning executive and producer, with a career focus on true stories, literary classics, and championing new talent. First time writers and directors have earned DGA, WGA, and Humanitas Prize recognition on her projects. She executive produced TAKING CHANCE for HBO Films starring Kevin Bacon, which debuted in Dramatic Competition at the Sundance Film Festival. TAKING CHANCE won the WGA Award, DGA Award, and the Humanitas Prize. The film garnered 10 Emmy® nominations, including Outstanding Television Movie and the Golden Globe nomination for Best Movie. Kevin Bacon won both the SAG and Golden Globe Award for performance. Wischner-Sola won Television Academy Honors, the Christopher Award, and was a nominee for the Television Producer of the Year Award from the Producers Guild. Wischner-Sola served as Vice President, Original Programming at TNT Originals where she shepherded and supervised an extensive slate of distinguished movies and miniseries, high budget international coproductions, earning network ratings and critical acclaim. Projects include PIRATES OF SILICON VALLEY nominated for the DGA Award and five Emmys®, DAVID COPPERFIELD (Hugh Dancy, Sally Field), Patrick Stewart’s A CHRISTMAS CAROL and KING OF TEXAS, and Orwell’s ANIMAL FARM. Wischner-Sola holds a BA degree from The New School for Social Research and attended Northwestern University. She is a member of the Television Academy.