Matthew A. Sprosty

When Matthew Sprosty was ten years old, he wrote his first short story, "The Deadly Girl," which won a Young Author’s Award and was placed on the shelves of the local library. From there, Matthew would write a variety of different mediums. From poetry, short stories, and screenplays, he found a way to express himself to compensate for being horribly shy in school.

His creative writing would gain him a spot in the School of Theatre at Ohio University in their playwriting department. Under Tony Award-Winning (and Pulitzer Prize nominee) Charles Smith, Sprosty would learn a whole new way of storytelling. In his second year at Ohio University, he would break boundaries, and be one of the first undergraduate playwrights to have a school sanctioned production of his full length play, "Ganareys’ 101." Before leaving Ohio University, Matthew would have two ten-minute plays produced, another full-length, and a reading of "Ganareys’" in Atlanta, GA.

Upon graduation, Matthew would be asked to be a Resident Playwright at the new Fourth Wall Productions in his hometown of Cleveland, Ohio. Off ticket sales for Sprosty’s first two World Premieres by Fourth Wall (which were performed at the famous Cleveland Play House), the theatre company was able to expand and take on productions of other talent, allowing Sprosty to also be Literary Manager. Sprosty wrote a play for every season for Fourth Wall, and even wrote two plays for its Second Season, putting one under a pen name. As a side project, Matthew would write short scripts to be filmed in order to promote the plays Fourth Wall was performing.

Sprosty’s plays have earned multiple awards (including Best Play) and rave reviews from critics, especially Linda Eisenstein, a playwright herself, who calls Sprosty "a playwright to watch… with unfailing black comic dialogue… and an ear for the rhythms of dudedom.” (CoolCleveland.com)

After twelve years of not writing short stories, Matthew decided to write one as a side project in his MySpace blog. The Artistic Director of Fourth Wall asked Matthew to adapt it into screenplay. Once completed, the screenplay found its way into the hands of Paul Coy Allen on the West Coast. The screenplay, "The Last Story of David Allan”, was optioned.

Since then, Sprosty has written several screenplays and television pilots, while continuing to write plays for Fourth Wall. While Matthew constantly works on shaping his writing, he’s the first to admit that writing shaped his life.

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