Amanda Callas is an award winning filmmaker, writer, performer, and producer. Her films have played and won awards in Vienna, Lisbon, Belfast, Iran, Scotland, Mexico, Australia, Bolivia, Capri, Palm Beach, and Los Angeles.
Amanda has done science writing for NASA, reconstructed Egyptian papyri, worked as a sushi chef, and played a nervous elf bride on a TV sitcom.
Amanda studied for her masters in Classics at the University of Cambridge, UK. She runs an independent children's and YA publisher, Little Owl House. These days she is always cooking, writing, taking photos, or most often, reading and exploring the world with her adventure loving, daredevil munchkins.
Amanda lives in Los Angeles with ever-growing stacks of books, and her sweet, rambunctious family of artists.
Favorite Show:
One of my favorite shows of all time is Turandot by Puccini, with an incredible staging by British artist David Hockney. I love it how it is dipped in acid color and beautiful, surreal scene-scapes, with of course, that lavish, sublime music.The Dapper Dans barbershop quartet at Disneyland are another childhood perennial favorite. I could listen to them all day.
Favorite Stories:
- Review: THE RAINMAKER at Laguna Playhouse - Gorgeous, luminous staging and pitch-perfect performances, the transcendent joy and restorative optimism of this production made me feel uplifted for weeks.
- Review: 70, GIRLS, 70 at Lonny Chapman Theatre - A great undiscovered, underrated musical that deserves its place in the pantheon, celebrating mischievous and delightful septuagenarian in New York City. The performances were utterly delightful, and I left the theatre humming great songs that are STILL stuck in my head.
- Review: ON BROADWAY at Smothers Theatre in Malibu - Absolute of embarrassment of riches with four stupendously talented Broadway singers, some of the most extreme talent I've ever seen concentrated in one place at one time. It was glorious. Unforgettable music, at one of my absolute favorite venues in Los Angeles, the Smothers Theatre, on the beautiful, secluded Pepperdine campus in Malibu.
- Review: SANTASIA – A HOLIDAY COMEDY at Whitefire Theatre - Off the rails indie holiday show was wildly entertaining, one of the funniest things I've ever seen, with real heart. Delicious cider and free cookies in the lobby. AND, I got to meet the Yeti. It doesn't get better than that.
- Review: BIRDS OF NORTH AMERICA at Odyssey Theatre -