Kiana Brizendine's Creative Portfolio
Kiana Brizendine
Creative Portfolio
Hello! I’m a collaborative multi-hyphenate creator who writes and produces stories of various forms -- primarily books, short stories, and episodic content.
Having previously worked as a showrunner's assistant on a TV show at FOX, I'm now an agent's assistant in the books department at the Gersh agency, getting to work hands-on with both the publishing and TV side of things.
WHAT AM I UP
TO NOW?
THE LUCKY ORPHANS
I'm currently shopping around a TV sci-fi/mystery pilot based on a novel I wrote. To read the pitch deck, show bible, and/or the full pilot...
PODCASTING
DON'T WORRY
2023
I WROTE, DIRECTED, PRODUCED, AND STARRED IN THIS RADIO COMEDY
Lucas Hart has a peculiar condition: everything he's afraid of will actually happen. For damage control, he’s been living alone on an iceberg in Utqiagvik, Alaska, where there is little to fear: without another person around, he can't mess up anyone else's life but his own. With an active (and anxious) imagination like his, relationships don't tend to go well for him.
When Alaskan police deem him unstable and ship him off to California to live with his last living relative, his little sister Jovie, Lucas has a lot to be afraid of: her resort for extreme skiers, its dozens of injury lawsuits, and her fiancé who is a world-record-holder for concussions.
As Lucas learns to manage his anxiety with a sketchy psychologist turned psychic, he tries to repair his relationship with his sister without destroying her wedding, her business, and her whole life in the process.
A group of friends and I created this radio series based on a TV pilot I wrote! I initiated contact with a local newspaper who covered the podcast. Check out that article below, as well as the website I created for the show!
OUR
WEBSITE
(Designed by yours truly)
INTERN WORK
I interned with FilmNation Entertainment (Anora, Promising Young Woman, Arrival, The Big Sick) for two terms, one summer remotely and one semester at the office in NYC.
I got to generate content and assist with production in a small team working with big talent -- one of which being Ed Helms for his podcast Snafu. I also got to do historical research and assemble outlines with three-act structures for a book of the same name (which can be ordered below.)
I also presented weekly coverage to the company, created visually punchy pitch decks from scratch, fact-checked scripts in development, and created archival footage logs for legal review (woohoo, spreadsheets!)
CREATIVE WRITING
HERE ARE LOG LINES AND LINKS TO MY FAVORITE SHORT STORIES.
PLEASE CONTACT ME FOR MY CURRENT WRITING SAMPLES.
EVE AND THE ARTIST, 2026
In small-town Wisconsin, a nude model develops a strong but indefinable bond with an artist named Percy, the pariah of the church community.
I'm currently submitting this short story, my favorite short story to date, to publications and contests.
THE URSULA PROJECT, 2024
After a tongue removal surgery, a young aquarium employee volunteers as a test subject for the initial trials of a prosthetic tongue promising to grant her speech again.
This story was published as the first piece in issue 8.2 in The Foundationalist, a competitive intercollegiate literary magazine that sets out to publish outstanding undergraduate works -- in this issue, thirty of the 650 submissions were published. See link below.
GHOST TOWN, 2021
A grieving writer goes on a hiatus to a ghost town in Alaska to avoid familial responsibilities. When his sister tracks him down to bring him home, he must convince her to disregard the story narrator's efforts to compel them to act like proactive "Hero's Journey" protagonists.
I produced a radio version of this meta short story (narrating the original text) that you can listen to below.
KID THE MAILMAN, 2024
A housewife in a lackluster marriage becomes extramaritally enamored with a bad boy: the new mailman, a very short ex-convict known by his cellmates as "Kid the Jailman".
This piece of flash fiction was published the fourth issue of Bard College's literary magazine, Feeding the Crows. See link below.
YOU MAKE ME CRAZY, 2021
A manic pixie dream girl discovers she's her schizophrenic boyfriend's hallucination, and to prolong her existence, she must sabotage his recovery efforts.
This short story made the longlist, constituting the top 2% of pieces submitted, for the 2021-2022 Masters Review Winter Short Story contest judged by Ye Chun. It was also shortlisted for the Vocal+ Fiction Awards Anthology in 2023 (see link below) out of 13,000 submissions.
FILM PROJECTS
SHORT FILMS, SCREENPLAYS, AND A MINISERIES
NO MAN'S LAND (SHORT FILM, DRAMA, 2019)
In an homage to The Twilight Zone, a flippant journalist conducts an interview with the mayor of a town with a 100% clean crime record. The journalist discovers that he must hold his tongue or fall to the same silent fate as the mayor's ill son.
I wrote, directed, edited, and produced this short film. Note for viewer: although there are medical masks in the film, I created this film before the 2020 pandemic. See revised screenplay (2021) below.
MOCK ADT COMMERCIAL (COMEDY, 2019)
This mock ADT ad tells you to stop settling for sketchy security systems -- such as "The Clink", a company that hires hardened ex-convicts to stake out in their customers' yards.
I worked in a team to create this film class assignment. I had this idea for the script and we all got together to write it and shoot it. It was super fun, and we laughed a lot.
THE BENEVOLENT BREAK-IN (3D ANIMATION SHORT, COMEDY, 2024)
A burglar's conscience thwarts his plans when he discovers his victim is a bad boyfriend.
I learned how to use Blender in my 3D Animation class. This is my final project for the class.
THE FIFTH WHEEL (MINISERIES, DRAMEDY, 2021)
An insecure high school girl steals the ashes of her recently-deceased clique leader to coerce her withdrawing friends into bonding on a pre-college road trip.
The story behind this miniseries: after an interview process, I was selected to be the director of my high school drama department's annual student-directed musical. When COVID-19 hit and the musical was canceled, I reworked the project and wrote a miniseries with a small cast, assembled a production team, researched and implemented industry-based safety protocols, and got the project approved by my school district's administration. As a high school senior, I wrote, co-directed, and co-produced it.
PHOTO EDITING
STRANGE CITY (PHOTO BOOK, 2024)
Prompted by a self-portrait project in my NYC Street Photography class with visual artist DW Fitzpatrick, I came up with the concept of replacing my face with models in NYC signage and photos of strangers (that I took with permission, of course.) I taught myself to use Adobe Photoshop to do this. My purpose with this book was to use comedy to explore the concept of belonging during my semester in New York City.
