Vidas Barzdukas is an award-winning writer and director whose films have been screened at numerous U.S. film festivals, featured on PBS stations and broadcast on television networks in Asia. In 2015, he earned accolades from The Columbus Dispatch for his "stirring and amusing" stage adaptation of Rafael Sabatini's 1922 swashbuckling novel Captain Blood. His film, the black-and-white fantasy The New Mr. Phillips, won best narrative short at the Oregon Film Awards, and he also won the best screenwriting award for his short film Cold at the Cincinnati Winterfilm Film Competition. Barzdukas was nominated for best writer (drama) by the International Academy of Web Television (IAWTV) for his work on the science fiction series Aidan 5, which was nominated for a total of 19 IAWTV awards. He is a writer on the Emmy-winning Nite Owl Theatre Starring Fritz the Nite Owl, which is a long-running, late-night staple of Central Ohio's film scene. In addition to theatre and film, Barzdukas works in educational publishing, where he writes a wide variety of textbooks and classroom materials for K-12 students. His educational publishing subjects include reading, language arts and history. Barzdukas' passion for education also earned him a spot on the Emmy-winning children's show Taylor's Attic as its educational writing consultant. A proud member of the Dramatists Guild, Barzdukas lives in Ohio with his wife and two daughters.
