Short bio
Stage
Born in Vancouver, Michael Lewis MacLennan now divides his time between Toronto, Vancouver and Los Angeles, working as a playwright, screenwriter and TV producer. With six published plays, he is a two-time finalist for Canada's prestigious Governor General's Award and the only playwright to win the Herman Voaden National Playwriting Award twice. His first play Beat The Sunset garnered Vancouver's Jessie Richardson Award for outstanding emerging playwright and the Theatrum National Playwriting Competition. Grace won the Theatre BC National Playwriting Competition and has been produced across Canada and internationally. His next two plays The Shooting Stage and Last Romantics both won the Voaden Prize and were Governor General's Award nominees. Other plays include Leaning Over Railings, The Fabulous Life, (commissioned by The Vancouver Playhouse) and Life After God (commissioned by Touchstone Theatre and adapted from the short story by Douglas Coupland (Generation X)). His most recent play The Good Egg premiered in 2009 and was published the same year. Current stage projects include the opera libretto for Ruth.
Screen
As a screenwriter, Michael MacLennan has been nominated five times for the WGC’s Canadian Screenwriting Award. He began his screenwriting career as Writer and Story Editor for CBC'S Wind At My Back, then working as Writer and Executive Story Editor for the PBS series Anne of Green Gables and Supervising Producer for the BBC/TV series Super Rupert. He was Co-Executive Producer on Showtime/Showcase's Queer As Folk, having written for the show for four seasons. With Keatley Entertainment he was Co-Creator, Executive Producer and head writer of City TV's flagship dramatic series Godiva's, which met with rave reviews and robust audiences. He wrote the pilot The Healer for Avenue Pictures (Angels in America, The Player, Closer) and Fox TV/CBS. He also cowrote the pilot The Box for Storyline (Chicago, Hairspray) and Touchstone Television/ABC. With Douglas Coupland he co-created the CBC series jPod, for which he wrote four episodes. Other recent scripts include The Guard and Being Erica, on which he served as Consulting Producer for the first season. Current TV projects include Natural High, a new series for BrightLight Pictures/CBC, and Threads, a German-Canadian co-production with Capri Film for CBC, RTL and BetaFilm. Current feature projects include Still Life With June for Amaze Film, a feature adaptation of The Shooting Stage for Optic Nerve, and Light at Dusk with Flimshow Inc.
Long Bio
Stage
Michael began his writing career as a playwright on the West Coast. His first play Beat The Sunset (published 1998: Playwrights Canada Press) won Vancouver's Jessie Richardson Award for outstanding emerging playwright, the Theatrum National Playwriting Competition and the Outstanding Islander Playwright Award. He also received Canada's last Telefilm Cross-Over grant in support of its adaptation. It had its international premiere in London, England September 1998. His next major play, Grace (published 1998: Scirocco Drama) won the Canadian National Playwriting Competition and has received productions in Calgary, Vancouver, Victoria, Toronto, Regina, London, England and numerous American cities.
Other plays include Come On! and Leaning Over Railings. Michael was a winner of the Herman Voaden National Playwriting Competitions for his highly-acclaimed new play entitled The Shooting Stage (published 2002: Playwrights Canada Press), which premiered in Vancouver and has received productions in London, Paris, New York, and San Francisco. The play was also a finallist for Canada's esteemed 2002 Governor General's Award.
His play The Fabulous Life was commissioned by The Vancouver Playhouse. He rewrote the book and dialogue for the major musical SwingStep which opened at Toronto's Elgin Theatre Spring 2000. He wrote the libretto for the short opera The Laurels and is currently at work, with composer Jeffrey Ryan, on Ruth, a new opera for Tapestry New Opera. With performer Matthew Simmons, he co-created the solo show Pink Ladies and Steak for the Sydney Arts Festival.
His next play Last Romantics (published 2003: Playwrights Canada Press), The Shaw Festival's first ever commissioned new play, also won the Herman Voaden National Playwriting Award. It was produced by Necessary Angel Theatre in Toronto and the National Arts Centre in Ottawa, Spring 2003. The play was nominated for the Governor General's Award, making him one of the only writers ever to be nominated for the award two years in a row.
As playwright-in-residence at Touchstone Theatre, he wrote Life After God based on the work of Douglas Coupland (Generation X). It premiered in Vancouver November, 2006 and was published in 2007 by Playwrights Canada Press. A subsequent production in Magdeburg, Germany. As playwright-in-residence at The Canadian Stage Company, he wrote his new play The Good Egg, co-commisioned with Ottawa’s Great Canadian Theatre Company. The hit of the Playrites Festival, it premiered at Alberta Theatre Projects in February 2009 and was published the same year. Current stage projects include a new play and the opera libretto for Ruth, based on the book of the bible. It is his third collaboration with composer Jeffrey Ryan.
As an adjunct professor, he also recently co-taught a full-term course in play development for the University of British Columbia. He has led master classes or panels in Victoria, Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Halifax, St. John's, Fredericton and Paris.
Screen
After a 1997 residency at the Canadian Film Centre, Michael now divides his time between Toronto and Los Angeles. He has written scripts for various short films including: Wedding Knives, The Photographer's Wife and Bagatelle, (winner, 2000 National Screen Institute Drama Prize), which have screened in numerous festivals and been broadcast nationally. His feature screenplay The Ice Man, directed by Thom Best, premiered in Toronto and is now available on DVD.
Michael has written over 50 television episodes and produced over 150. He started writing scripts for Sullivan Entertainment's CBC Television series Wind At My Back, quickly moving to Story Editor. He then created all stories for the PBS animated series Anne of Green Gables, for which he was supervising story editor. He then Co-Created the series Super Rupert for BBC/YTV and ran it as Supervising Producer. He co-wrote Anne Of Green Gables: The Movie. His docudrama for Devine Entertainment on the painter Francisco Goya aired on PBS and YTV, and was nominated for the Writers Guild of Canada Screenwriting Award. He has been nominated for the award now five times.
He was Co-Executive Producer of Queer As Folk, for which he wrote 15 episodes. He was also Creator, Executive Producer, and Head Writer of City TV's flagship dramatic series Godiva's. He wrote the pilot The Healer for Avenue Pictures (Angels in America, The Player, Closer) and Fox TV/CBS. He also cowrote the pilot The Box for Storyline (Chicago, Hairspray) and Touchstone Television/ABC. With Douglas Coupland he recently co-created the CBC 1-hour series jPod, for which he wrote four episodes.
Recent work includes scripts for The Guard and Being Erica, on which he served as Consulting Producer for the first season. Current TV projects include Natural High, a new series for BrightLight Pictures/CBC, and Threads, a German-Canadian co-production with Capri Film for CBC, RTL and BetaFilm. Current feature projects include Still Life With June for Amaze Film, a feature adaptation of The Shooting Stage for Optic Nerve, and Light at Dusk with Flimshow Inc.
In addition to his own projects, Michael is a much sought-after story editor and script consultant.