Matthew Leavitt

Matthew Leavitt is an award-winning playwright, director and librettist based in Los Angeles. He is also the co-artistic director of the theatre company The 6th Act. His most recent play, Sukkot, will have its off-Broadway premiere at 59E59 this summer. (Its world premiere was previously at the Skylight Theatre in Los Angeles.) His previous play, The $5 Shakespeare Company, was recognized as an LA Times Critics’ Choice. His first play, The Boomerang Effect, is published by Concord Theatricals and received seven Stage Scene LA Awards, including Best World Premiere Play.

As a librettist, he has been commissioned by LA Opera twice to write the librettos for new operas, Orpheus and The Wreck of the Miranda (both collaborations with award-winning classical and film composer Nathan Wang). Other collaborations with Nathan Wang include the musical Kid Gloves (Skylight Theatre), Shanghai’s World Emporium (Huntington Library) and several musical Shakespeare adaptations at The Ebell of Los Angeles.

Selected directing credits include John Patrick Shanley’s Outside Mullingar (Matrix Theatre and Skylight Theatre), Hamlet (The 6th Act, Stage Scene LA Award – Best Direction of a Play), Legally Brunette (World Premiere – Garry Marshall Theatre in LA, 54 Below in NYC), Sonnets From Suburbia (World Premiere – Edinburgh Fringe Festival; 59E59 in NYC), The Brothers Abelson Since 1946 (World Premiere – Electric Lodge), The Scorpion and the Frog: a time killer (World Premiere – Hollywood Fringe Festival), Arrival (Sci-Fest LA) and Goes the Weasel (Ammunition Theatre Company).