about me
The daughter of Iranian political activists, Denise grew up in Germany understanding that stories aren’t just entertainment... for some people they’re lifelines.
After being published in a short-story anthology at thirteen, she briefly attempted a sensible career in pre-med... but it didn’t stick (turns out, she prefers fictional ailments to real ones).
Choosing to “follow her bliss” (per Joseph Campbell), she moved to Los Angeles and immersed herself in the industry, taking on every role from P.A. and script reader to editor and rotoscope artist. Mostly, she was just doing whatever it took to write in the evenings.
This hands-on education paid off in 2014 when she won UCLA’s prestigious TV Writing Competition, which opened the door to representation and launched her career (people finally started taking her obsession seriously).
She’s been writing for TV and film ever since, climbing from Staff Writer to Co-Executive Producer and gathering tons of on-set experience. But her favorite part is still the same as when she was a kid: sitting down and weaving a world out of words.
writing career
From the courtroom to the cosmos, the battlefield to the badlands, Denise has built her career on mastering any world you put in front of her.
She’s currently Co-Executive Producer on the crime drama “DELIVERANCE”, following her work on the medical drama “STAT”, and Kurt Sutter’s new Western, “THE ABANDONS”.
Prior to that, she led the writers’ room for the fourth season of “HOW TO SELL DRUGS ONLINE (FAST)”, produced the comic-book adaptation of “BATWOMAN”, unraveled political conspiracies in “MANHUNT: DEADLY GAMES”, explored the galaxy in the groundbreaking Sci-Fi gem “THE EXPANSE”, and delivered heart-pounding military drama in NBC’s “THE BRAVE”.
She cut her teeth on the final season of the witty “FRANKLIN & BASH” and Ava DuVernay’s critically acclaimed drama “QUEEN SUGAR”.
On the development side, Denise’s pilot “VIPER” has been optioned and is being developed for the British market.
She was also tapped to adapt the gripping true-life spy drama “UNDERCOVER”, and has developed several original projects, including the thriller “IN TRANSIT”, TV adaptations of the YA novel “THE HIDDEN MEMORY OF OBJECTS” and the graphic novel “EPOCH”, and a reboot of the cult classic film “THE LEGEND OF BILLIE JEAN”.
And because a good story is a good story, no matter the medium, Denise has also lent her writing and story consulting talents to blockbuster video games like the award-winning “MIDDLE EARTH: SHADOW OF MORDOR”, the critically lauded “RISE OF THE TOMB RAIDER”, and the epic “CALL OF DUTY: INFINITE WARFARE” franchise.
lecturer
Committed to mentoring new talent, Denise pays it forward as a guest lecturer for the MA Serial Storytelling program at Cologne’s International Filmschool -- Europe’s first-ever graduate program for television writers.
It’s a role that feels like a homecoming. Having grown up in Germany, she now gets to bring her Hollywood insights back home. Her goal is to demystify the mechanics of successful writers’ rooms for the next generation of European creators and to prepare them to compete on a global stage.
