About (Biography)

Hoyt Hilsman

HOYT HILSMAN is an award-winning playwright, screenwriter, author and critic, and most recently a candidate for Congress. He has written screenplays for a number of studios and television networks, including Disney, Sony, New Line, ABC, NBC and CBS, and his stage plays and musicals have been produced in theaters around the country and abroad, and have won numerous awards. His television script, Foggy Bottom, based on his childhood in Washington, was honored at the 2005 Slamdance Festival. Mr. Hilsman has been a regular theater and television critic for Daily Variety. He has written, produced and directed several independent films and television series, including Deadly Embrace, Snow Without Name and Beneath The Eyes of God.

Mr. Hilsman has also been an active participant in the national political scene and was a candidate for Congress in California in 2006. He has written hundreds of articles and op-eds for national newspapers and magazines, including The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Baltimore Sun, Los Angeles Magazine, Variety, Hemispheres and The National Law Journal. He has also written a number of books on media and politics, including The New Electronic Media and the upcoming Pitching New America. He is a recipient of the Apex Award for Excellence in Journalism. He has also been a consultant to a variety of corporations, non-profits and governmental organizations, including Vulcan Ventures, Idealab!, The Kennedy Space Center, The National Museum of Patriotism, The Inventors Hall of Fame, Unocal, Mead Data Central, International Data Corporation, Harcourt Brace Publishers, Nomura Securities and other media and entertainment companies.

He has taught playwriting and screenwriting at UCLA and is the founder of the Pasadena Writers Workshop. He is a past President of the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle, a judge of the PEN West Literary Awards and he has recently helped to organize a series of “Intentional Conversations” for business, civic and arts leaders throughout Southern California.

Mr. Hilsman grew up in Washington, DC, where his father was an Assistant Secretary of State and advisor to JFK. He has been active in politics ever since, and has worked with various national figures, including President Bill Clinton and Senator Joe Lieberman, He has been an advisor to several Congressional campaigns in California, was a delegate to the 2004 Democratic National Convention and in 2006 ran for the Congressional seat held by Republican David Dreier, Chairman of the House Rules Committee. He is a director of the Hope Street Group, a non-partisan policy organization of business professionals devoted to Opportunity Economics and a member of the Pacific Council on World Affairs.

Mr. Hilsman is active as a community volunteer. He has taught creative writing to students in the public schools in East Los Angeles through a volunteer program at PEN West. He has been a volunteer at Union Station (a homeless shelter in Pasadena), and been active in the Writers Guild and other community organizations. He is a graduate of Columbia College and Columbia Law School. Mr. Hilsman is married to the painter Nancy Kay Turner, has one child and lives in Pasadena.