Michael Mitnick is a playwright, screenwriter, and songwriter.
His plays and musicals include Scotland, PA (Roundabout Theatre Company; New York Times Critics’ Pick), Fly By Night (Playwrights Horizons; Drama Desk Award nomination for Outstanding Musical), Mysterious Circumstances(Geffen Playhouse), Sex Lives of Our Parents (Second Stage), The Siegel (South Coast Repertory), Ed, Downloaded(Denver Center), and Spacebar: A Broadway Play by Kyle Sugarman (The Wild Project).
His film credits include The Current War, directed by Alfonso Gomez-Rejon, and The Giver, directed by Phillip Noyce. He has also collaborated twice with director Luca Guadagnino, on The Staggering Girl, a Cannes Film Festival selection, and O Night Divine. His television credits include HBO’s Vinyl, produced by Martin Scorsese and Mick Jagger.
As a songwriter, Mitnick’s music and lyrics have been performed at Lincoln Center, the Guggenheim Museum, Joe’s Pub, and 54 Below, as well as on HBO. He also contributed material to President Barack Obama’s 2014 White House Correspondents’ Dinner speech.
His honors include the TheaterMasters Visionary Playwright Award, the BMI Robert B. Sherman Award, and three Edgerton New Play Awards. He is an alumnus of the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop, Ars Nova Play Group, and Interstate 73, and has served as a mentor with the 52nd Street Project.
Mitnick holds a B.A. from Harvard University and an M.F.A. in Playwriting from the Yale School of Drama, where he studied with Paula Vogel and Lynn Nottage. Born and raised in Pittsburgh, he lives in New York City.