Blake Hackler is an actor, director, playwright and educator living and working in Dallas, Texas. As a playwright, Hackler’s work has been seen across the U.S. and won several awards. He is a lifetime member of the esteemed BMI/Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Writing Workshop and was the 2009 recipient of the Harrington Award for Excellence in Musical Theatre Writing. His plays, The Necessities and What We Were both received nominations for the Harold and Mimi Steinberg Award. His adaptation of Ibsen’s Enemy of the People was named Best Play of 2018 by the Dallas Observer. Other plays include: This Sweet Affliction – Yale Cabaret, DRILLS Winner, Primary Stages, The Boss in the Satin Kimono - New York International Fringe Festival, 10 Reasons I Won’t Go Home With You (lyrics)  – Midtown Theatre Festival, Winner Best of Fest, The Lady in Red – Gene Frankel Theatre, Mother Courage of Westchester – NYTE, Barry Horowitz: A Jewish Fantasia on Catholic Themes – Prospect Theatre and The Wasp Woman – a musical written with Phillip Chernyak. Blake holds a BFA in Acting from Roosevelt University, and an MFA in Acting from the Yale School of Drama.  He currently serves as the Head of Acting at Southern Methodist University.  He was named a Fulbright Scholar to Bulgaria in 2015, and in 2018 received a MacDowell Fellowship for Playwriting.