The LIU School of Film and Digital Media hosts world-class film and TV industry professionals who share their experiences and expertise with our students. They include writers, producers, directors, actors, cinematographers – all those creative artists who tell a story on a screen.
Our extraordinary group of Artists in Residence hold master classes and workshops and work one-on-one with our students on special projects. Learn more about their amazing work below!
Cinematographer in residence: Larry Banks
Larry Banks is known for his movies Juice and New Rose Hotel as well as his work in the music video industry on Public Enemy’s Fight the Power, Naughty By Nature’s, Hip-Hop Hooray, Arrested Development’s Revolution, Tracy Chapman’s Born to Fight, Lisa Lisa’s, Kiss Your Tears Away, Rob Base Joy & Pain, Orange Juice Jones Pipe Dreams, Living Color’s, Middle Man, to name just a few.
Actor in residence: Keith David
Keith David is a classically trained actor, Emmy Award winner and Tony Award nominee. Born and raised in New York City, Keith is a graduate of the New York High School of the Performing Arts and the Juilliard School. His expansive film credits include 21 Bridges, Night School, Disney’s The Princess and the Frog, Requiem for a Dream, Men at Work, They Live, Crash, There’s Something About Mary, The Thing, Platoon and many others.
Screenwriter in residence: Matt Ember
Matt Ember is a writer and producer of many television shows and feature films, including The Conners, on ABC, War with Grandpa (starring Robert Deniro, Uma Thurman, Rob Riggle, Christopher Walken, Cheech Marin and Jane Seymore), and Home (starring Jim Parson, Rihanna and Steve Martin). He has taught at LIU’s M.F.A. in Writing and Producing for Television, NYU, and Wesleyan University.
Directors in residence: Jonathan Frakes and Anthony Ruiz
Jonathan Scott Frakes is an American actor, author and director. Frakes is best known for his portrayal of Commander William T. Riker in the television series Star Trek: The Next Generation and subsequent films. Frakes also hosted the television series Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction, challenging viewers to discern his stories of fact-based phenomena and fabricated tales. In June 2011, Frakes narrated the History Channel documentary Lee and Grant. He was also the voice actor of David Xanatos in the Disney television series Gargoyles.
Frakes directed and also starred in Star Trek: First Contact as well as Star Trek: Insurrection. He has directed dozens of episodes of the Star Trek franchise, including six episodes of Star Trek: Picard. He is also the author of a book called The Abductors: Conspiracy.
Anthony Ruiz is a versatile actor with limitless range. He has appeared in over 40 films and television projects, including standout roles opposite LaKeith Standfield (The Changeling), Ana de Armas (Exposed), Christopher Meloni (Law & Order: Organized Crime), Selena Gomez (Only Murders in the Building), David Letterman (Late Show with David Letterman) and Queen Latifah (The Equalizer).
Anthony has also appeared in over 25 national commercials opposite various celebrities including Michael Strahan, Dave Chapelle and John Leguizamo.
Comedy Writer in Residence: Julie Klausner
Julie Klausner is the creator, writer and star of Hulu’s critically acclaimed Difficult People. Julie was most recently co-executive producer on season 3 of Schmigadoon! for Apple TV+, which she also co-executive produced and wrote for seasons 1 and 2. She was also recently a co-executive producer and writer on Amazon’s reboot of The Kids in the Hall sketch show, and a consulting producer on Tina Fey's Mr. Mayor on NBC. She was head writer and co-executive producer for seasons 1 – 4 of Billy On The Street. Additional writing credits include Mulaney, Triumph & Jack, Best Week Ever with Paul F. Tompkins, and The Big Gay Sketch Show. She’s also written for Robert Smigel’s “TV Funhouse” on SNL, and for the late Joan Rivers on a few different occasions.
Julie can be seen on screen in her recurring role on The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, FX’s Fosse/Verdon, and At Home with Amy Sedaris. Her voice can be heard on FX’s What We Do In the Shadows, Netflix’s Big Mouth and on the upcoming Long Story Short created by Raphael Bob-Waksberg. She can be heard hosting her weekly podcast How Was Your Week and co-hosting Double Threat, along with Tom Scharpling, distributed by Forever Dog.
Producers in residence Patrick Coker and Adam Wiesen
Adam Wiesen and Patrick Coker are screenwriters and producers based in New York City. Graduates of Long Island University's Graduate Media Arts program in Brooklyn, they are also alumni of the Writers Guild of America-East's inaugural showrunner program here in New York. They were Supervising Producers on East New York (CBS). Prior to that, they Executive Producers and showrunners on season 3 of Tales (BET) after writing for the previous two seasons of the anthology series. On the development front, they've sold pilots to HBO, FX, Live Nation, and Paramount Television Studios. Coker made his episodic directorial debut on Tales for Episode 6 centered on C.R.E.A.M. by Wu Tang Clan. They’ve spoken at Urban World Film Festival, SVA, SUNY Buffalo, L.I.U. Brooklyn, Queen City Film Festival, and Writers Guild educational programs. They are currently in development at NBCUniversal.
TV writer in residence Valerie C Woods
Valerie is a writer/producer in television and film and also a publisher, editor, and author. In 2022, she was a Writer/Co-Executive Producer on Season 1 of the Disney+ series The Crossover. She also worked in the same position for the limited series The Big Cigar, coming soon to Apple TV+.
Currently, she is developing through her MCV Productions banner three projects: a limited series based on Wrapped in Rainbows – The Life of Zora Neale Hurston, the award-winning biography written by Valerie Boyd; an episodic TV series adapted from A Cowboy to Remember, and the Cowboys of California romance trilogy by Rebekah Weatherspoon; and a screenplay, Homecoming, adapted from the historical Christmas romance written by NAACP Award-Winning author, Beverly Jenkins.
