Clay Nichols

Clay Nichols is a husband, father, author, playwright, teacher, and now screenwriter and television host. He has written over a dozen plays for both young and adult audiences that have been produced across the country, most recently in Los Angeles, Chicago, Denver and Louisville, Kentucky. Titles include Appleseed John, The Speaker Speaks and The Nose in Exile. His plays have received awards from the Center for American History at the University of Texas, the Austin Critics' Table, The Playwrights' Center of San Francisco, and Stages Theatre of Houston, among others. His book "Pulling Off Your Shorts: Filmmaking for Teens" co-authored with Troy Lanier, published in April 2005 by Michael Wiese Productions, has been widely praised by critics and kids alike. A second and revised edition will be released in 2010.

Nichols is a veteran of a dozen years in the high school classroom, having taught in the areas of English, Creative Writing, Drama and Filmmaking. As a consequence he has read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn way too many times.

Nichols is a graduate of Dartmouth College and holds an MFA in playwriting from the University of Texas where he was a James A. Michener Fellow at the Texas Center for Writers. He is founder and director of the Theatre Focus program at St. Stephen's School and the Texas Arts Project. He lives in Austin, Texas with his wife and three children ages eleven, eight and five.