James Serpento
Acting
Biography
James Serpento is a largely Midwestern performing artist, filmmaker, and educator, having been raised in Iowa, and educated at Iowa State University (Ames) and Indiana University (Bloomington). He credits such Midwestern institutions as Chicago Dramatists, the Bloomington Playwrights Project and the Iowa Scriptwriters Alliance with his development as a writer for stage and screen. His favorite city is Chicago, where he spent a number of years as an actor, director, writer and teacher before moving on to Los Angeles, where he has worked primarily as a director onstage, and to which he occasionally returns. His current projects are a musical version of Euripides' "The Bacchae," for which he co-authored book and lyrics with Jeff Charis-Carlson, with music by Sarah Evans; and two new plays, "Every Cottage Home" (co-authored with Louise Bylicki), and "Doll" (about Franz Kafka). A collection of new short plays, "Love, For Short," co-authored with R. Andrew White, adapted from works of Anton Chekhov, was published in 2021. He has one child, a son named Samuel.
Known For
Dylan, a young man working at a funeral parlor, is trying to unravel a mystery that shattered his life ten years earlier. After faking his own funeral to see who will show up, he befriends a mysterious street junkie and is reunited with an old love from his past. The lives of these three characters are transformed by supernatural forces as Dylan discovers that no one is who they seem to be.
Dead Awake
A sexually transmitted disease causes students to drop dead at an alarming rate on a Midwest campus. When Cameron discovers his girlfriend is the first victim, he becomes the first suspect.
Spread
Romantic comedy. A small town teenager's angst about sexual inexperience drives a comic quest for love and understanding on a birthday to end all birthdays.
16 to Life
Jury of Her Peers. Inspired by a real unsolved Iowa axe murder from 1900 and drawing on the work of Pulitzer Prize-winning author Susan Glaspell, this gripping murder mystery explores trust, betrayal, and the cost of long-buried secrets.
Jury of Her Peers
Professor David Salt's guilty secrets draw him to the fabled town of Villisca. Past and present collide as he is driven to help the trapped spirits and seek his own redemption.
Haunting Villisca
When a serial killer is targeting prostitutes and draining their blood, a detective and his unusual new partner must try to solve the case before another young woman is killed.