Donna Di Novelli

Donna Di Novelli has a writing career that spans film, opera, music-theater, radio and stage.

Di Novelli attended the 2018 Sundance Film Festival as the co-writer of "Madeline’s Madeline", directed by Josephine Decker, chosen as one of the top ten movies of the decade by The New Yorker magazine. The film screened at the Berlinale and BAM’s CinemaFest, is distributed by Oscilloscope, and available on Amazon Prime Video. She conceived and wrote the found text piece,"The Good Swimmer" a Pop Requiem composed by Heidi Rodewald and directed by Kevin Newbury, which sold out in BAM’s Next Wave Festival, 2018 after a workshop at the Prototype Festival. She has written libretti for Paola Prestini’s "Oceanic Verses" 2012, Kennedy Center, Barbican Centre; and for the San Francisco Opera commissioned, "Heart of a Soldier" (2011) music by Grammy-nominated Christopher Theofanidis. As a lyricist, her collaborators include Oscar-winner, Rachel Portman, composer of "Little House on the Prairie", which sold out in its premiere at the Guthrie Theater and subsequently went on a National Tour. As a screenwriter, she penned the award-winning short film, "Stag" (2015) directed by Newbury and available on iTunes. She teaches playwriting and screenwriting at New York University. She has won fellowships from the MacDowell Colony, UCross, and The Rockefeller Foundation Center in Bellagio, Italy.

WEBSITE AND SOCIAL MEDIA
http://donnadinovelli.com
FB: Donna Di Novelli
@ddinovelli

MORE ABOUT ME
The very first play of mine that was produced was “Crushed Tomatoes” when I was studying with Paula Vogel for my MFA at Brown University. Paula had invited adjudicators from the American College Theater Festival to attend. On opening night, Paula came to me and told me not to let my people go after the show, because the judges would like to talk to them. At the end of the play, I ran as fast as I could through the theater to the exit doors at the back of the house and stretched my arms out to bar the audience from leaving the theater. The audience was confused. The audience wanted to leave. I wouldn’t open the doors. Paula came running. Paula: What are you doing?  Me: You told me not to let my people go. Paula: I meant the CAST.

WHAT I'M WORKING ON
I'm working on a new short film "Nubile", proof of concept for the full-length feature of the same title; a tv pilot; and a new music-theater piece.  All collaborations.

KEYWORDS
BAM's Next Wave artist, daughter of an immigrant, playwright, screenwriter, librettist, lyricist, feminist, off-beat.