Marina Michelson

Marina Michelson is director, writer, producer, and actor originally from Tel Aviv, born to Soviet émigrés from the Republics of Georgia and Moldova. Her work explores identity and power dynamics through the day-to-day lived experiences of women, as well as her upbringing as a third culture kid.

Her background includes extensive study with the Atlantic Theater Company, Steppenwolf Theater, Lee Strasberg Studio, and a BFA from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. She is adept at collaborating with actors and holding space in a way that allows for rich, grounded performances. As a filmmaker, she has a knack for textured, immersive world-building. Her work in indie film and theater has yielded favorite acting credits such as the lead role in the film Should’ve Kissed, which premiered as the opening selection of the Jeonju International Film Festival, and the lead in Amy Herzog’s After The Revolution at the Chance Theater, praised by the LA Times as full of “grace and grit.”

Her short film, Biophilia premiered at the 2018 Brooklyn Film Festival where it garnered the Outstanding Achievement Award for Best Screenplay, and her newest short, Stagiaire, premiered at the 2021 Maryland Film Festival and was subsequently nominated for the Next Great Filmmaker Award at the Berkshires International Film Festival. Previous work includes the shorts face time, shot entirely over video chat, and Eureka! which premiered on Indieflix on Amazon Video. She was selected as a 2019 artist-in-residence at the Wurlitzer Foundation in New Mexico and a 2022 Sundance Lab Finalist for her script “Anoushka”, a coming-of-age fantasy feature film set in 1970s Soviet Union. In addition to filmmaking, she co-founded Mimoda Studio, a multi-purpose community arts space in Los Angeles, and it’s adjacent coffee shop, Paper or Plastik Café.

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