JEFF BAY SMITH

Jeff Bay Smith is a professional screenwriter with 20 years of experience in film production. Currently, he works with his writing partner, Lawrence Michael Levine, to write and revise feature-length screenplays for Hollywood studios and development companies.

In the past, his own original screenplays, A Shot in Heaven (2017), Christoff (2017), and Benjamin the Bear (2012) placed as quarter-finalists for the Academy Nicholl Fellowship, semi-finalists for the Nantucket Writers' Colony, and were considered in the final round of selection at the Sundance Screenwriters’ Lab.

Smith was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, and grew up on the tropical city-state island of Singapore. In his early pursuit of filmmaking, he became inspired by the narrative and artistic aspects of Robert Gardner’s documentaries, particularly Dead Birds (1965) and Forest of Bliss (1986), and chose to study anthropology at the University of Colorado in Boulder with an interest in ethnography. His artistic sensibilities developed further under the guidance of experimental filmmaker Stan Brakhage. After graduation, he joined the cinematographers’ union and worked for a decade in New York City as a professional camera assistant ("Law & Order: C.I.", "Law & Order: S.V.U.", Netflix's "Master of None") before transitioning to screenwriting full-time in 2020. He received his MFA in filmmaking from Columbia University.