Kate Kirtz  

Kate Kirtz is a writer, director, script doctor and instructor of narrative theory for screenwriting.

Kirtz attended the Columbia graduate film program, where her screenplay 'Jealous' was honored as a Faculty Selects Script. Kirtz co-wrote the screenplay for the ensemble dramedy GABI ON THE ROOF IN JULY, which was the Opening Night Film and won the Best Picture and Best Actress awards at the 2010 Brooklyn Film Festival. Gabi has since won Special Programmer's Awards at the Sidewalk and IndieMemphis festivals and screened at the Los Angeles Film Festival, among many other awards and screenings.

Kirtz is producer and director of the documentary feature film JANE: AN ABORTION SERVICE, which played in competition at the Sundance, Edinborough and New York Film Festivals, and was broadcast on PBS and internationally. JANE received the Paul Robeson Fund for Independent Media Distribution Grant, the ITVS Production Grant, the Center for New Television Post Production Access Grant and the NEA Regional Artists Fellowship Production Grant. It has been honored with the Silver Apple Award for Best Educational Video at the National Educational Media Festival, among many other awards.

Kirtz was story consultant on director Eric Drath's feature documentary RENEE, which premiered at the 2011 Tribeca Film Festival, and went to HotDocs, Los Angeles, and Frameline Film Festivals, among others. She also consulted on WE ARE THE HARTMANS, which premiered at the Atlanta Film Festival, THE HOLLOW TREE for filmmakers Ruben Amar and Lolas Bessis, Randy Dottin's INDELIABLE and Liz Hinlien's GETTING TOMMY LAID, among others.

Kirtz's thriller screenplay HEARTBEAT made the second round of consideration for The Sundance Institute Screenwriter's Lab, and was a second round pick in the 2011 Austin Heart of Film Screenplay Competition. Kirtz is currently developing her dark comedy script BE THE MONSTER as her fiction directing debut. (8/14)