Stephen Whipple is a Chicago-based writer and director. born and raised in Vermont, Whipple spent a decade after high school vagabonding around North America, then situated himself in the midwest for seminarian studies, merging his two beloved spheres, theology and cinema. after schooling, he transitioned into full-time film work swiftly, working in lighting and camera support on numerous commercial television and feature film sets for studios such as AppleTV, Amazon Prime, MGM+, and AMC. As a director, his first short film, Peckish, won the Best First-time Filmmaker award at Cannes World Film Festival 2023; in August 2024, he and his core collaborators completed his second short film, Waiting for Vera. While happy writing in solitude, he also thrives on bustling sets. He considers his years spent honing a technical understanding of the filmmaking craft while working as a crew member an inestimable asset, thoroughly informing both his writing process and his days on set directing. Whipple is currently developing his first feature film, Idle Hours, a slow-burning, contemporary ghost story set in rural New England. his writing and filmmaking desires to be suggestive over explicative, contemplative, ritualistic, quietly apocalyptic and religiously archetypal.