User:PopCultureTastemaker

Tomas Mureika (born May 29, 1967 in Washington, D.C.) is an American-Canadian filmmaker, playwright, storyteller and music critic/journalist/book and magazine editor. He directed, produced and starred in his first dramatic work at the age of 11. More than twenty plays, twenty films (alternating writer, director, producer, actor and technical positions) and a host of published writings later, he is still working as a multi-threat storyteller, crossing into numerous art forms and media. During his teen years, Mureika established himself in the dramatic and musical theatre scenes, winning awards for Best Original Play and Best Director for "Calamity," “Foley Mansion Murder” and “The Boys of Autumn” at the New Brunswick Provincial Drama Festival[1]. He proceeded to sweep the top awards for Best Director, Best Original Play, Best Actor and Best Production with “Seniors”, which was also named Best Canadian Play by the Writers’ Federation of New Brunswick [2] and Best New Play by the National Young Playwright’s Competition, chosen by famed author and dramatist Paul Zindel.

Mureika wrote, directed, co-produced and starred in “Easter”, which received the Special Adjudicator’s Award at the Quebec Drama Festival [3]. “Easter” was successfully launched at the McGill Players’ Theatre (MPT) [4] and then remounted five years later in Los Angeles for a sold out, extended run. While serving as the Artistic Director for the MPT, Mureika also wrote and directed the hit drama, “Cathedral”, which was the centerpiece of the company’s 1987-88 season. In the 1990s, Mureika earned his MFA in Filmmaking at the prestigious University of Southern California School of Cinema-Television in Los Angeles, where he wrote and directed a collection of over a dozen films, including the multi-festival award-winning “Light at the End” and his darkly post-apocalyptic adaptation of “The Handmaid’s Tale”. He followed his graduate work at USC by independently producing the Western feature, “Driftwood”, [5] which Mureika also wrote, directed, edited and sound designed. “Driftwood” was chosen as the Gala Closing Night Screening at the 1994 First Look Film Festival at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA).

Mureika has worked on writing feature film projects for Bruce Willis, Robert Downey Jr. and Viggo Mortensen, including "Deep in the Heart" [6], as well as serving as Editor-in-Chief and writing extensively about film and music for two acclaimed international pop culture periodicals (ICE and Lexicon Magazines). He has been a has a regular music reviewer for All Music Guide since 1995 and has been published in their online and print editions. His reviews have appeared in Rolling Stone, Pitchfork and BBC News, as well as on iTunes, CD Baby and Wikipedia. Mureika also edited a series of books comprising the “Everything U Need to Know…” volumes for McGraw-Hill Publishing and served as publicist for the Tupac Amaru Shakur Foundation, working with Afeni Shakur on 2Pac's "Loyal to the Game" album, Tupac's Madame Tussaud's wax figure in Las Vegas and the launch of the Tupac Amaru Shakur Foundation's art school for underprivileged students. He also worked as publicist for Chastity (Chaz) Bono. In 1989, he began a lifelong collaboration with USC Film School friends Ross Dunkerley and Trevor Rhodes to form the band, FSI (Four Squared Images), a cinematic art rock trio, which still performs and records to this date.

In addition to working as Music Supervisor on the trailers and advertising campaigns for films including "The Fast and the Furious," "The Princess Diaries" and "Monsters, Inc.", he also made a cameo alongside Owen Wilson in 2011’s “The Big Year”. Mureika has given workshops on playwrighting, directing and filmmaking throughout the United States and Canada. Since 2010, Mureika has also worked as technical, sound and music designer on numerous theatrical productions, including “The Vagina Monologues.” Mureika was also part of the creative team behind internationally-renowned Headlines Theatre's 2013 forum theatre play, "maladjusted." After a temporary hiatus from filmmaking, Mureika is returning to his true childhood passion with his next film venture, “The X Generation”, which was a finalist in the 2012 Fresh Voices Screenwriting Competition [7] for Best Comedy, Best Dialogue and Best Role Written for a Lead Female.

PLAYS (as writer-director - acting/tech credits not featured): "School Daze" (1979) "Calamity" (1980) "Foley Mansion Murder" (1982) "The Boys of Autumn" (1983) "Isosceles" (1984) (Directed by Heather Brown & Jonas Mureika) "Seniors" (1984) "The Final Curtain" (1985) "Will-o'-the Wisp" (1986) (Music & Lyrics by Tomas Mureika & Andrea Boyd) "Da Vinci" (1986) "This Last Dance" (1986) "The Great X-Rated All-American Sex Show" (1987) "Easter" (1987) "Cathedral" (1987) "Black Rock Summer Spectacular" (1988) (Written by Tomas Mureika & Melanie Little) "Easter (Version II) (1992) "maladjusted" (2013) (Directed by David Diamond)

FILMS (as writer-director - acting/tech credits not featured): "Metro" (1986) "7" (1986) "Death of Innocents" (1987) "Apocalypso" (1987) "The Mating Game" (1988) “The Lobotomy Awards” (1988) “Eva Reman” (1988) "Day One" (1989) "Another Morning After" (1989) "This Last Dance" (1989) "7 - Blue Scratch II" (1989) "Pure Evil" (1989) "Light at the End" (1990) "The Sisters" (1990) "The Handmaid's Tale" (1991) "Driftwood" (1994) "Deep in the Heart" (1995) (Directed by Alex Monty Canawati) "Black Revelations" (1998) "The X Generation" (2016)

References 1. ^ New Brunswick Provincial Drama Festival. "NBPDF". NBPDV. http://nbdramafest.com/main.html. 2. ^ Writers Federation of New Brunswick. "1986 Winners". WFNB. http://wfnb.ca/wnners.htm. 3. ^ Quebec Drama Federation. "Quebec Drama Festival". Concordia University. http://archives.concordia.ca/P164. 4. ^ McGill Players Theatre. "Players Theatre". McGill. http://ssmu.mcgill.ca/players/. 5. ^ imdb. "Driftwood". imdb.com. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1928157/. 6. ^ British Film Institute. "Tomas Mureika Filmography". BFI. http://explore.bfi.org.uk/4ce2bb42ef3c1. ^ Fresh Voices Screenwriting Competition. "Finalists". Fresh Voices. http://www.fresh-voices.com/2012-screenplay-competition-quarter-finalists.html