Catherine Black AKA Cat Black (She/They) is a Canadian-American director-writer-actor and acting instructor, and a proud member of SAG-AFTRA, AEA, ACTRA, CAEA and The Alliance of Women Directors.   Cat has been coaching and teaching actors for 20 years. She began coaching child actors and was an on set acting coach in Toronto. She has studied and taught various acting techniques in Toronto, Los Angeles and London, but having studied “Paradigms” with Stuart Rogers for 10 years, it was a natural evolution for Cat to teach what she believed in and become a certified teacher with the studio. Cat loves to teach because it makes them a more inspired artist, and she loves teaching Paradigms because it is an intuitive acting process that takes actors from an objective point of view about a character to a first person experience of a life. Paradigms is ever evolving, so it’s always inspiring. Cat is devoted to their evolution as an educator - to continue to learn how to best serve all actors while creating safe spaces for actors to be their most creative. She has great insight, but Cat’s real gift as a teacher is teaching with heart and making sure everyone feels that they belong.   Cat has been lucky to live and work as an actor, director, producer and acting teacher in both Toronto and Los Angeles. She was cast as Juliet at the age of 16, where a life long dedication to acting and storytelling began. Cat went on to star in many multi Dora award winning theatre productions such as Crimes (Canadian Stage) and Walls of Africa (Theatre Passe Murraile) while consistently working in TV and film. Most recently Catherine was cast in a guest starring role on season 2 of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (2023). Best known for playing Vanden in American Psycho opposite Christian Bale and starring with Crispian Glover in The Donner Party. Cat has performed in many award winning independent films and studio movies like Loser, Shock Value and Stay Cool, and has booked countless guest starring roles such as Odyssey 5, Blue Murder, Mr. Headmistress, I love Mummy, Highlander: The Raven, In a Heartbeat, Show Me Yours and Playing House. Other recent credits include a supporting role in the feature film Debt Collectors (2020) and a lead role in the comedy feature, BitterSweet (2023). At the beginning of 2020, Cat had the privilege of starring in And Then They Came For Me directed by Abigail Deser with MainStreet Theatre which won the LA Stage Alliance Ovation award for Best Production of a Large Theatre.   Cat’s extensive practice as an actor and artist has rooted their vision in filmmaking. The first five directors Cat worked with as an actor were visionary women like Mary Harron and Amy Heckerling – inspiring Cat to direct one day. She was lucky to shadow many talented directors early on, and went on to produce commercials, award winning short films and music videos. Cat wrote, directed and starred in the ‘sexy and surreal’ short film, De Puta Madre a Love Story that won Cat Best Director (London IFF) and Best Lead Actress (Madrid IFF), and the film won Best Cinematography (Columbia Gorge IFF) along with multiple Jury Awards, Special Mentions and nominations Internationally. Cat also starred in, directed and co-wrote Girl Trip, a dark comedy that took home five awards and acquired Worldwide distribution on SHUDDER and Prime. Most recently, Cat was hired to direct Like Nothing Happened that premiered at the 39th Minneapolis St. Paul International Film Festival, and won Best Drama at the 2021 Rock The Shorts Film Festival and has been hired to direct her 4th project in Toronto in 2023.   Cat is also currently writing her next film, What Happened To Charity, a dark comedy feature film. https://catherineblack.com/ https://www.directedbycatherineblack.com/