Biography
Laura Ekstrand is the founder and Artistic Director of Vivid Stage (formerly Dreamcatcher Repertory Theatre). Her full-length plays include What Stays (with Jason Szamreta), Whatever Will Be, The Neighborhood (Book and Lyrics; Music by Joe Zawila), Brink of Life (Book; Lyrics by Steve Harper; Music by Oliver Lake) and Astonishment, How to be Old: A Beginner’s Guide, and At Ninety-Three (Adaptations). One-acts include June Asserts Herself, Playing to the Gallery, MoJo, and others. As an actor, she has appeared in NJ at Dreamcatcher, the Bickford Theatre, Passage Theater, 12 Miles West, The Theater Project, Luna Stage, and the Pushcart Players. In New York she has worked at Naked Angels, Ensemble Studio Theatre, and New Georges, among other theatres. Laura has been featured in such films as Split Ends, High Art and I Shot Andy Warhol, and on television on Hack, Sex And The City, Law & Order, and The Guiding Light. Some of the plays she has directed at Dreamcatcher include The How and the Why, Things Being What They Are, Next Fall, Distracted, The Pursuit Of Happiness, Melancholy Play, Pride’s Crossing, Full Bloom and many others. She is a private monologue coach and holds a BA from Yale University and an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. Laura is a member of AEA, SAG-AFTRA and the Dramatists Guild.
