Biografia
BIOGRAPHY
Stephanie Morgenstern has built an award-winning career across multiple fields: starting as an actor, she expanded into filmmaking, screenwriting, directing, and showrunning. She was honored as a National Indie Treasure by Toronto's Eye Magazine, featured in Montreal's Voir Magazine as a New Face to Watch, and named one of three 'Great Expectations' filmmakers at the Telluride International Film Festival in Colorado.
TELEVISION. Most recently, Morgenstern served as Executive Producer for Season 2 of NBC/CTV's medical drama 'Transplant,' where she helped develop the season and character arcs alongside the writing team and co-wrote the Season 2 premiere episode with Mark Ellis. Over the past few years, she has worked as a freelance television director on hour-long dramas including 'Nurses' (NBC/Global), 'Burden of Truth' (CBC/CW), 'Killjoys' (Space Channel/Syfy), and 'Hudson & Rex' (CityTV).
Morgenstern co-created, wrote, executive produced, and showran CBC’s WWII espionage drama 'X Company' with Mark Ellis. The series earned a Canadian Screen Award nomination for Best Television Drama during its debut year and completed its third and final season in Budapest in fall 2017, with Morgenstern directing the two-part series finale. Prior to that, she and Ellis co-created, wrote, and executive produced 'Flashpoint' (CBS/CTV/Ion), earning the Writers' Guild of Canada Showrunners of the Year award. They co-wrote 20 of the show’s 75 episodes, receiving both a Gemini and WGC Award for Best Writing in a Television Drama. 'Flashpoint' was recognized with the Academy Board of Directors Tribute for Outstanding and Enduring Contribution to Canadian Television in 2013, won the 2009 Gemini and 2013 Canadian Screen Awards for Best Dramatic Series, and received the Innovative Producers Award at the Banff World Media Festival. The Academy ranked 'Flashpoint' as the #2 Canadian television show of all time, second only to 'Degrassi.'
FILMMAKING. Morgenstern directed the critically acclaimed WWII short drama 'Remembrance,' which she co-wrote and co-starred in with Mark Ellis. The film earned a Genie Award nomination for Best Short Live Action Film, won Best Canadian Short at the Worldwide Short Film Festival, and received the Jutra Award for Best Short. It also won a Jury Award and garnered five nominations (including Best Direction and Best Drama) at the Golden Sheaf Awards in Yorkton. 'Remembrance' premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival, received Certificates of Merit from the San Francisco and Chicago International Film Festivals, and was showcased in the Filmmakers of Tomorrow section at Telluride. Morgenstern and Ellis won TIFF’s national Pitch This! Competition in 2005, with the prize funding the development of 'Remembrance' into a longer dramatic project that eventually became 'X Company.'
Her first short film, the bilingual 'Curtains/Rideau,' co-directed with her brother Mark Morgenstern, was also nominated for a Genie Award for Best Short and received five Golden Sheaf nominations. It earned Morgenstern the Best Script award at Yorkton, where she and her brother jointly won for Best Direction. 'Curtains/Rideau' toured widely across English and French-language festivals and won the Palme d’Or at the Festival mondial du cinéma de court métrage in Huy, Belgium.
ACTING. Fluent in English and French, Morgenstern acted professionally for over 20 years. Her credits include films such as 'Maelstrom' (Denis Villeneuve), 'The Sweet Hereafter' (Atom Egoyan), and 'Revoir Julie' (Jeanne Crépeau); television series like 'This is Wonderland' and 'At the Hotel' (CBC); and theatre performances across Canada including 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' at the Stratford Festival, 'Romeo and Juliet' at the Globe Theatre, and 'Goodnight Desdemona, Good Morning Juliet' at the Grand Theatre. She also provided the original English voice for Sailor Venus in the cult anime series 'Sailor Moon.'
EDUCATION. Raised in Montreal, Morgenstern began her professional acting career at age 15. She earned a BA in English from McGill University and studied drama at the Banff Centre School of Fine Arts. She later moved to Toronto to pursue an MA in Social and Political Thought at York University. Additionally, she is an alumna of the Women in the Director's Chair Master Class and a graduate of the Berlinale Talent Campus.
