Lindsey Rosin filmed her first TV pilot the summer after she graduated from Penn in 2007, which is kind of a big deal.
“I realize it’s a very rare sort of occurrence,” said Rosin, “I’ve been fortunate to sell quite a few pilots since then, but it’s a hard process, and it doesn’t just happen, and for me to be that young and happen? It was just sort of serendipity.”
But Rosin is more than just the lucky TV writer she often says she is. She’s a “multi–hyphenate,” or someone who somehow finds the time and effort to do everything, meaning she’s a director, producer, playwright, novelist and former child extra on 90210. It’s no surprise that she has this talent for storytelling though, because it runs in the family. Her father was the show runner of 90210 for the first five seasons, and her mother was a cowriter.
Recently, she’s been getting recognized for her musical adaptations of popular movies and TV shows. Her musical, Cruel Intentions: The Completely Unauthorized Musical Parody, was not only popular among fans of the original movie, but the cast and crew of the original movie as well. The show was sold out throughout its run from February to April 2015, and many of the cast members of the movie came to watch it as well (Sarah Michelle Gellar went twice!). Currently, Rosin and her writing partner, Jordan Ross, are hoping to bring the musical full of '90s pop tunes to a venue in New York.
In fact, the musical was so wildly successful that Rosin recently filmed a pilot for a Cruel Intentions spin off TV show which is being co–written and executive produced by Roger Kumble, the creator of Cruel Intentions. For fans of the movie, you’ll be excited to hear that Sarah Michelle Gellar will also be producing and reprising her role.
Just this past month, Rosin also became a novelist. Her debut novel, Cherry, is a young adult novel about four teenage girls in their last year of high school, on a quest to lose their virginity before graduation day. When she first pitched the novel to Simon & Schuster, Rosin pitched it as a “female American Pie,” but for her, the novel is much more than just about female sexuality and high school sex pacts that we’re all used to making.
“As a woman with wonderful female friends, going through any experience in your life, you need your friends—your executive committee,” she explained, “But I think especially in sexual relationships or romantic relationships or dealing with questions of identity and how that ties into sexuality, it just became apparent to me that it needed to be a story really about friendship.”
Back when Rosin was finishing up high school herself, she knew that she wanted to be a writer— which is why she came to Penn instead of a writing conservatory program. “I decided at the end of the day what I really wanted was a broad liberal arts education, which is why Penn became my first choice,” she explained.
During her time at Penn, Rosin was a writer for Bloomers, and a member of the Excelano Project.
“That was a life changing experience,” she said, “And even though I don’t fancy myself a performer, it was sort of invaluable education in writing and performing to get up on stage and perform my poetry, and really just have to stand up behind anything I wrote. I had an incredible time.”
Even today, her time at Penn helps her create her stories and also evaluate her own success, perhaps a bit too harshly.
“I wrote a screenplay for my thesis, but I remember a lot of people writing novels,” she remembered, “And there are so many fun things about Cherry, but to really feel like I joined the ranks of authors is pretty cool.”
We're not entirely sure just how many hyphens she plans on adding, but keep an eye out for more of Rosin's work!
