Leena Pendharkar
Leena is an Emmy nominated, Award-Winning Director and Writer. She is currently in post on her third independent, feature film Days with Dandekar, which was part of the Tribeca All Access program. She premiered her sophomore feature film, 20 Weeks, at the Los Angeles Film Festival. It was distributed in theaters and on Hulu, and called, “an intimate, compassionate take on abortion,” by the LA Times.
In television, she wrote and directed A Date with Deception for Lifetime Movies, and Hello Jack! for AppleTV+, for which she was nomiated for a Children and Family Emmy Award. Her award-winning short films have also played extensively in festivals, and been distributed on platforms such as Omeleto, ShortsTV and Vimeo Staff Pick. She is an Associate Professor at LMU, where she teaches filmmaking, and holds an MFA in Screenwriting from UC-Riverside, Palm Desert.
