Matt Friedman

Matt Friedman teaches filmmaking at the Governor's School for the Arts in Norfolk, Virginia. He wrote the local independent feature comedy, Moving, in the early 2000s (for which he won "Best Screenplay" at the Digital Visions film festival in Chicago), then his second script won him a fellowship to the Sundance Screenwriters Lab, where he was the inaugural recipient of the Sloan Foundation Fellowship for science themes in film. He assistant directed the 2012 Doritos commercial "Man's Best Friend," which became the #1 ad of that year's Superbowl, then wrote and co-wrote several followups. He edited the Luthiel's Song fantasy series and Growth Shock by Robert Fanney. He is also active in the theater, having acted in and directed several plays including Enron and Hand to God , mostly at the Generic Theater, where he was a founding member of the Artistic Team and for whom he has written and directed a series of comedy shorts. In 2016, he produced and scored the short film Moss Manor , which won Best Film at the Hampton Roads 48 Hour Film Project and also garnered him the award for Best Original Score. He later won the 2017 prize for "Best Writing" for his short film at the Seven Cities Film Showcase. He has been a screenwriting panelist at the Virginia Festival of the Book, a screenwriting workshop instructor at the CNU Writer's Conference, and helped launch the new film department at the Governor's School for the Arts, where he adapted and directed their educational feature, The Unknown Variable. He has also kept himself busy over the years as a volunteer EMT, and a graphic & web designer at Frame25 Productions.