Laura Harkcom is a Los Angeles-based writer and producer. Laura co-created, wrote and produced the TV series, The Lost Room, for the SyFy Channel. The show was nominated for two Emmys and a Writers Guild Award. The New York Times called it, “…a jackpot for a mystery series,” while Entertainment Weekly cited it as a, “…stark noir, pulpy fiction, spiritual thriller, hero's-quest fantasy, and brainy videogame all at once. One of the most creative ideas to hit TV in a while.”

She has also written feature scripts for Columbia Pictures, Miramax Films and The Weinstein Company, and co-created the comic book series, We Kill Monsters, currently in pre-production as a feature film at Imagine Entertainment. Prior to writing and producing, Laura was a studio executive at Warner Bros., where she oversaw the critically acclaimed film The Iron Giant. For the past 15 years, Laura has also worked as a television and feature film consultant for clients such as NBC/Universal, DreamWorks SKG, The Korean Film Council, and private clients. Most recently, she co-created and executive-produced the sci-fi television show, The Building, for Fox Television Studios. Neil Gaiman has recently come on board to shepherd development. Born and raised in Pittsburgh, Laura received her B.A. in writing and theater arts from Carnegie Mellon University. You can learn more about Laura at: lauraharkcom.com.

In this special Encore StoryBeat presentation of Phil Proctor, Phil's two separate wonderfully fun StoryBeat interviews have been combined into a single glorious podcast featuring one of the funniest, most multi-talented men ever to grace stage, screen, TV and books.

Phil Proctor’s 68-year career has taken him from Broadway, where he appeared in “The Sound of Music” and “A Time for Singing” to a lifetime of writing and performing all over the world.

He has appeared for over half a century on LPs, CDs, DVDs and on stage and screen. He is best known as one of the founding members of the legendary Firesign Theatre, the tour-de-force four-man comedy group listed by Entertainment Weekly as one of the “thirty greatest acts of all time.” A few of Firesign’s beloved comedy albums include “Waiting for the Electrician or Someone Like Him,” “How Can You Be in Two Places at Once When You’re Not Anywhere At All?,” “Don’t Crush That Dwarf,” “Hand Me the Pliers,” “I Think We’re All Bozos on This Bus,” “The Tale of the Giant Rat of Sumatra,” “Everything You Know is Wrong,” and “The Three Faces of Al.”

Phil has recently released his page-turning new autobiography, “Where’s My Fortune Cookie, My Psychic, Psurrealistic Story,” co-written with Brad Schreiber.

You can keep up with Phil on his popular monthly blog “Planet Proctor” at planetproctor.com.

Peter Marks is a staff writer for the Washington Post and has been that grand paper’s chief theater critic since 2002. Prior to that, he was a reporter and theater critic for 10 years for The New York Times.

Peter’s positions at the Times included a stint as a national correspondent, covering the 2000 Presidential campaign. Before that, he did stints at the Newark Star-Ledger and other New Jersey newspapers.

Peter was a reporter and feature writer for Newsday, where, in 1992, he was on a team of reporters that won the Pulitzer Prize for local reporting, for coverage of a New York subway crash.

He is co-author with the late AIG CEO Bob Benmosche of the 2016 memoir, “Good for the Money: My Fight to Pay Back America,” which is the story of Benmosche’s life, culminating in his successful revitalization of the insurance giant that was hobbled by the 2008 financial crisis.

Peter’s writing has appeared in a variety of other American publications, and for several years he taught theater criticism in the honors program at George Washington University.

Peter is also co-host of the theater podcast “Three on the Aisle,” with critics Terry Teachout of the Wall Street Journal and Elisabeth Vincentelli, a contributor to the New York Times.

Novelist, playwright, and screenwriter, Stephen Fife, has also written feature articles for The New York Times, New Republic, Village Voice, New York Newsday, and American Theatre. His screenplay The Falling Man has won several awards. Steve’s most recent novel, “Angel’s Glance,” has just been published and is available on Amazon.

Steve also penned “The 13^th Boy: A Memoir of Education and Abuse,” which is the soul-baring story of his experience at the prestigious Horace Mann School in New York City, and also the book “Best Revenge: How the Theatre Saved My Life and Has Been Killing Me Ever Since.” His two books of poetry include “Dreaming in the Maze of Love-Grief-Madness” and “Twisted Hipster.”