John Penney

Award winning writer/director, John Penney, attended UCLA where he studied film and received a degree in English. In addition to his screenplays, John has written short stories that have won him an award from the Adelphi Academy in New York and have been published in the "Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction."

In 2011 John wrote and directed the supernatural thriller “Hellgate” starring William Hurt and Cary Elwes. The film was awarded Best Film at the Bram Stoker International Film Festival, as well as the Best Horror Film from the Fantasy Horror Awards in Italy, sponsored by Syfy Europe Universal. Prior writer-director credits include the thriller “Zyzzyx Road” starring Katherine Heigl and Tom Sizemore, the family film “Magic” with Robert Davi and Christopher Lloyd, and a segment in the anthology film “Virus of the Dead.”

In 2017 John formed the genre company Dark Arts Entertainment with Brian Yuzna, (“Re-Animator” “Honey I shrunk the Kids”) which has been producing a range of quality, marketable features and multimedia projects tailor-made for today’s discerning horror audience.

John is also currently prepping his next feature film, “Crossover,” based on his novel “Truck Stop” and co-writing the final sequel to the seminal genre film “Re-Animator” for The Wolper Company.

In addition to his directing, John has written the screenplays for such films as "The Enemy" starring Roger Moore, Luke Perry, Olivia D’abo; “Contaminated Man” starring Peter Weller and William Hurt; "A Breed Apart" with Robert Patrick, Andrew McCarthy; "In Pursuit" with Daniel Baldwin, Claudia Schiffer , "Matter of Trust" with C. Thomas Howell. “The Kindred” with Rod Steiger, "Return of the Living Dead 3" with Mindy Clarke, "Past Perfect" with Eric Roberts, Laurie Holden and “Amphibious 3D” with Michael Pare.

John also served as a producer on his films “Zyzzyx Rd” ,"A Breed Apart", "Matter of Trust" and "In Pursuit.” and Executive Producer on the feature “Reborn” (2019) with Barbara Crampton, Chaz Bono and Peter Bogdanovich.

In 2012 John wrote his first novel “Truck Stop” and followed that up in 2013 with his second novel, “Killing Time.” He is also featured in the book on screenwriting by Jose Prendes, “The High Concept Massacre” along with fellow screenwriters Carl Gottlieb (“Jaws”) Amy Holden Jones (“Mystic Pizza” “Indecent Proposal”) and Doug Richardson (“Bad Boys” “Die Hard 2”).

John has been an adjunct Instructor at The Los Angeles Film School since 2013 where he teaches writing and directing.