In May 2007, Shira-Lee Shalit was chosen by Steven Spielberg out of 12,000 directors, as one of 12 finalists for the Fox/Dreamworks TV show, ON THE LOT. While on the show, Shira-Lee wrote and directed the films, Check Out, Beeline and Open House to critical acclaim from the judges, Garry Marshall, Carrie Fisher, David Frankel and Brett Ratner.
Selected as one of SHOOT magazine's Up and Coming new directors of 2009, Shira-Lee recently screened at the DGA in NYC.
Her feature film directorial debut was A-List - a comedy starring Daphne Zuniga, Sally Kirkland, Renee Taylor, and Damon Shalit.
A-List won the Audience Award at the 2007 Milan International Film Festival, the Gold Remy Award for Best Comedy at the 2006 Worldfest Film Festival, TX, and was selected for the LA Women's Directors Film Fest, the Miami International Womens Directors Festival, and profiled as one of the IFP Easts Project Involve Awardees.
Born in South Africa, Shira-Lee grew up in Houston, TX, where as a high-school senior she was awarded the prestigious President at Scholar of the Arts Award in Acting, and performed at the White House for the President. She also won the National Foundation for the Advancement in the Arts Award and was named an Outstanding Young Woman of America.
Shalit graduated from NYU with a BFA in Acting and received her MFA in Directing at Columbia Universitys Graduate Film Division.
While at Columbia, Shira-Lee wrote and directed her first short film, Full Cycle, which was named a Finalist in the Student Academy Awards.
In June 2008, Shira-Lee directed the powerful dramatic piece -Open Air, written and produced by David Paterson, (writer/producer of Disneys The Bridge to Terabithia.) Open Air won a 2009 Award of Excellence from the Accolades Film Awards, was a Finalist in the USA film festival, won a Bronze Remi Award at Worldfest, TX and was nominated for Best American Short at the Swansea Intl. Film Festival, UK. It's been selected for the Palm Beach Intl. Film Festival, Cleveland Intl, Sedona, New Jersey, Rhode Island Film festival and 15 others so far.
At Columbia University, Shira-Lee teaches Directing Actors to the Grad. Film students, Acting for Film and TV classes at the New York Film Academy (for the past 8 years) and Creating Character workshops to the master classes at the Labyrinth Theatre Company. Shira-Lee is currently at work on her next feature.