Stephanie Falkeis is a multilingual writer and director from the Austrian Alps, working internationally. She received her MFA in Directing/Screenwriting from Columbia University on a Fulbright Scholarship. Through her writing and films, Stephanie questions notions of otherness and belonging, the blurring of personal and political identities, and our fraught relationship to the natural world. She has spoken on various panels about the emerging field of Climate Storytelling.
Stephanie is a recipient of the 2024/2025 SFFILM Rainin Grant and the 2024 First Feature Fellowship by the Austrian Ministry of Culture (BMKÖS) for her debut feature REQUIEM FOR A GLACIER, and received development funding from the Austrian Film Institute (ÖFI). The project participated in the scriptLAB program by the Austrian Writers Guild and in StudioCanal's CannesFilm Screenwriting Residency.
Stephanie is a 2020 BAFTA Newcomer Fellow and 2021 Sloan Foundation Grantee. Her short films screened at festivals worldwide, including Athena Film Festival, International Film Festival Hof, Diagonale Festival of Austrian Film, Kitzbühel Film Festival, Bergwelten Filmfestival, New York Women in Film and Cyprus International Film Festival, among others.
Stephanie’s historical miniseries THE INVISIBLE SISTER, about the life of Margarete Wittgenstein, received Austria’s inaugural «Heldinnen in Serie» Scriptwriting and Commissioning Grant (BMWFW, FISA+) and was invited to pitch at SerienCamp and CannesSeries CWC. She is currently developing the cold-war series CITY OF SHADOWS, set in occupied post-WW2 Vienna.
Stephanie has taught and lectured at Columbia University, University of Kassel, University of Innsbruck, University of Applied Arts Vienna, and University of Lichtenstein, among others. From 2015-2018, she curated a film festival for the Austrian Cultural Forum New York. She holds a degree in Transmedia Art from the University of Applied Arts Vienna (Studio Brigitte Kowanz).
