Nikole Beckwith

Nikole Beckwith was a writer and director whose debut feature, "Stockholm, Pennsylvania," debuted at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival. Having been born and raised in Newburyport, Massachusetts, Beckwith was actively involved in her community's local theater scene. She began acting in plays while still a young girl, and soon tried her hand at writing them. As an aspiring playwright, Beckwith found that she had a knack for crafting realistic characters and dialogue, which showed through in her work. With that in mind, Beckwith left Massachusetts permanently in 2006 and relocated to Brooklyn, New York, where she saw her plays staged at various theaters throughout the city, among them, New York's legendary Public Theater. It was also during this time that Beckwith began writing a dramatic screenplay about a young woman who returns home to her family after enduring a traumatic kidnapping. The script was called "Stockholm, Pennsylvania." Beckwith's screenplay went on to earn her a prestigious Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting in 2012. The script also landed on the 2012 Black List, which ranks the best unproduced scripts circulating around Hollywood. Due to all the buzz surrounding the script, Beckwith was able to secure financing to direct "Stockholm, Pennsylvania" in 2013. The film starred Saoirse Ronan and Cynthia Nixon, and had its world premiere at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival.