Leo Finnie is a thirty year veteran in the entertainment industry. As a Drama Desk and Obie Award winning actor, Leo regards the theater as his deepest passion. He has originated and played roles in dozens of plays in the most prestigious theaters across the country from the Mark Taper Theater in LA, the Goodman Theater in Chicago, Yale Rep, the 2nd Stage and Circle Rep Theaters in New York, as well as the Royal National Theater of London to name a few. He spent four years working with the late-great playwright August Wilson during the development of the highly award winning play JITNEY. He is an alumnus of Northwestern University, and holds a MFA Degree from Brooklyn College where he taught Dramatic Structure and Acting as an Adjunct Professor. Leo’s interest in screenwriting began during an internship in the development department of the Multi-Emmy Award Winning PBS Series AMERICAN PLAYHOUSE. As a screenwriter, in the form of a six-hour miniseries and a dramatic episodic TV series entitled BREEDS, Leo has chosen to focus on the incredible untold stories of the fabulous Black Jockeys of the 1800’s who won multiple Kentucky Derbies. His feature film screenplay, JOCKO, tells the story of Oliver Lewis the former slave who won the First Kentucky Derby and saved the South. The completion of his novel about Oliver Lewis and the birth of the Kentucky Derby is underway.