Film, performance, and storytelling — one body of work across stage, screen, and voice.

Featured

Worthy of Survival — Feature film, in development · Writer & Director
A dual-timeline feature about trauma, care, and the fragile work of surviving when the past refuses to stay buried.

Hero Mars — Short film (debut), festival-selected · Writer & Director
A short about living outside rigid binaries — and choosing self-definition within, and despite, the world's constraints.

Selected Performance Work

Othello — Theatre · Impact Theatre & Livermore Shakespeare Festival · title role
The title role across two productions and two chapters of a life — a rare performance arc through Shakespeare, identity, and transformation.

A One Man Show — Solo theatre · TheaterFirst · Writer & Performer
A one-person show about identity, transition, survival, and the human cost of becoming yourself.

LASSO — Film · Trish
A no-nonsense cowgirl kidnapped — along with a troupe of rodeo performers — by the cult that runs the rodeo.

Collective Rage — Theatre · Betty Five in Jen Silverman's Collective Rage: A Play in 5 Betties

Skyler Cooper

CREATIVE WORKFilm & Performance

Film

Worthy of Survival
Feature film — in development
Writer & Director

A dual-timeline feature about trauma, care, and the fragile work of surviving when the past refuses to stay buried.

Its proof of concept — the short film Worthy of Survival: First Contact — was completed in 2024.

Directing actors on set The slave catcher, by firelight
Skyler Cooper, director — with Crystal Gix as Jordan · Malcolm Rodgers as the slave catcher.
At the desk, cutting the flag sequence
Into the work — recording with the microphone
In the recording booth, setting the pages
Observing, listening, performing, shaping — the actor-director process of Worthy of Survival.
Hero Mars
Skyler Cooper's multi-award-winning writer-director debut · short film
Writer & Director

A short film about living outside rigid binaries — and choosing self-definition within, and despite, the world's constraints.

Completed in 2011.

Hero Mars, on set With Diana Lu. In the edit with editor Manuel-Manoli Tsingaris In the edit with editor Manuel-Manoli Tsingaris.
Taking shape

A documentary exploration of Human-Centered Communication.

Explore HCC →

Performance

Othello
Impact Theatre — dir. Melissa Hillman (2004)
Livermore Shakespeare Festival — dir. Michael Wayne Rice (2019)
Title Role

A title role across two productions and two chapters of a life — a performance arc through Shakespeare, identity, and transformation.

Othello — Impact Theatre
Othello — Livermore Shakespeare Festival
Two productions, two chapters — Impact Theatre · Livermore Shakespeare Festival 2019, dir. Michael Wayne Rice — with Nicole Odell (Desdemona). Two productions of Othello, performed at different points in my personal gender transformation.
A One-Man Show
TheaterFirst — dir. Domenique Lozano · One for All, the Marin Shakes solo series
Writer & Performer

A one-person show about identity, transition, survival, and the human cost of becoming yourself.

A One-Man Show — the five characters
The lemon necklace
The pipe and hat
Show art — One for All, the Marin Shakes solo series · past production. A scene from A One-Man Show A scene from A One-Man Show.
Collective Rage: A Play in 5 Betties
Shotgun Players — dir. Becca Wolff
Betty Five

A performance in Jen Silverman's play exploring identity, desire, language, and theatrical transformation.

Collective Rage — sparring scene
Collective Rage — embrace
Collective Rage — cast on set
Collective Rage — cast and crew With Atosa Babaoff, Raisa Donato, linda maria girón, and Nicole Odell — the five Betties.
Lasso
Film — dir. Evan Cecil
Trish

A no-nonsense cowgirl kidnapped — along with a troupe of rodeo performers — by the cult that runs the rodeo.

Lasso With Heather Mignon and Andrew Jacobs.
The Owls
Independent feature — dir. Cheryl Dunye · screenplay by Sarah Schulman
Ensemble Cast

A queer independent feature with an ensemble cast including Guinevere Turner, V.S. Brodie, Lisa Gornick, and Deak Evgenikos.

The Owls — official poster