"spine tingling, vividly real." -The Dallas Morning News, on Darkstep and Dawning
"It's a complex and intelligent score. One of the best out there in the theater world." -The Oregonian, on Ablaze: an a cappella musical thriller
2012 Drammy Award
Original Script: To Cape
2013 Drammy Award
Script and Score: Ablaze: an a cappella musical thriller
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Matthew B. Zrebski
Founding Member | Vice President
Matthew B. Zrebski is a multi-award winning playwright, composer, script consultant, teaching artist, and producer-director whose career has been defined by new play development. He has served as the Artistic Director for Youth Could Know Theatre, Theatre Atlantis, and Stark Raving Theatre - all companies specializing in new work - and since 1995, has mounted dozens of world premieres. Notable productions include Joseph Fisher’s plays Prometheus Bound, Cupid & Psyche, Faust. Us., and Tundra (Kennedy Center Fund For New American Plays Recipient) as well as the recent Bob: A Life in Five Acts, Orlando, and the premiere of Rob Handel’s I Want to Destroy You.
In addition to directing, Matt has had many of his own plays and musicals produced, including the planet ME, Neck, A Place Called Timothy, Hunger, Parts, After the Zipper, Darkstep and Dawning, The Vespiary, Hunter in the Corner, The Aquavarian, Handprint Alley, Rubber 'n' Glue, Sharp Ecstasy, To Cape, Ablaze: an a cappella musical thriller, Chrysalis, and Carnivora.
Through the Education Theatre Program at Oregon Children’s Theatre, he was awarded back-to-back commissions to pen both Texting the Sun and 1 ½. The former toured off and on through 2013 and was seen by nearly 60,000 students. The latter toured through 2011 and was featured in the One Theatre World Conference. He has also been featured multiple times in JAW: A Playwrights Festival, most recently with his short plays, Big Sis and Glow.
In addition to his work in professional theatre, Matt is a passionate advocate for arts education, spending half his time as a guest instructor in public schools. As the Resident Teaching Artist at Portland Center Stage, he teaches playwriting through Visions and Voices. He also mentors through Literary Arts’ Writers in the Schools (WITS) program and is on staff for the Acting Academy at Oregon Children’s Theatre where he teaches acting, directing, and helped to found Ink Well, a playwrights lab. In 2005, he founded the Annual New Works Festival at Lincoln High School, which was featured in the 2011 Fringe Festival in Edinburgh, Scotland. He holds a BFA in Theatre from the Meadows School of the Arts at Southern Methodist University and is a proud member of the Dramatists Guild of America and The Recording Academy.