Biography
Melanie Schiele is an award-winning screenwriter, director, and producer from Brooklyn, NY. She is among 32 pioneering MFA-Film Production graduates of NYU's Tisch School of the Arts Asia, with festival premieres and awards spanning Tribeca, Atlanta, Palm Springs, Bilbao, Portland, Traverse City, BAMcinemaFest, Brazil, Maine, San Francisco, Cinefiesta, Los Angeles, and Singapore. Her directorial debut "Delilah, Before" premiered at Palm Springs ShortFest, won Best Short Film at the Tribeca Film Festival, and was distributed in Tribeca's YouTube Screening Room as well as on the global platform Viki. Her follow-up "Rockaway" premiered in the "New Mavericks, Women Directors" program at the Atlanta Film Festival and continued its fruitful journey on the circuit, earning awards in writing, directing, and acting. It was distributed to VOD subscribers via the Film Festival Collective.
In addition to an MFA degree, Melanie has a BFA in Screenwriting with Honors from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, where she completed the 4-year intensive writing program in 2 years as an internal transfer student from the College of Arts & Sciences. Throughout the duration of her studies, she was recognized as a University & Alumnae Club Scholar, Tisch Merit Scholar, Dean's Fellow, Governor's Committee Scholar, and Paulette Goddard Scholar.
Melanie's feature drama screenplay "Butterfly Children" won the Grand Prize in the Slamdance Film Festival's Screenwriting Competition (from 2500 entries). It has received 30 more accolades, including those from Sundance, Nicholl, PAGE, CineStory, ScreenCraft, and American Zoetrope. It recently made the NYU Purple List, an annual selection of the best production-ready screenplays from NYU alumni, in partnership with The Black List.
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