Judi Jordan's creative career began as a fashion designer in New York City where her collection sold to Bloomingdale's, Bergdorf's among others. Marriage to a European entrepreneur took her to Switzerland, where she designed for the Haute Couture fabric house Schlaepfer St Gallen. After this, she moved to Paris where she ran the Licensing Design for Balmain, designed accessories for Karl Lagerfeld's Chloe, and Haute Couture for Louis Feraud. She had already begun writing, and Robert Altman optioned her screenplay in Cannes about a dysfunctional Hollywood marriage. Returning to the US, Judi transitioned to entertainment via Costume Design for Showtime and indie films, and as an Entertainment editor/writer, she did scores of interviews with stars like Javier Bardem, Guillermo de Toro, Diego Luna, Penelope Cruz, Benecio del Toro, and others for print and digital publications including The Hollywood Reporter, US Weekly, Celebrity, Venice Magazine, Latin Style, Latino Leaders, Latin Heat and Estylo magazine, covering Oscars and Emmys. She studied Screenwriting at UCLA, USC, and took master classes with Syd Field, Karl Iglesias, Pilar Alessandra, Richard Walter, Linda Seeger, Robert McKee, Blake Snyder, and Michael Hauge. Judi studied Directing with Mark Travis, Judith Weston, and Fernando Trueba. Her shorts include a dance film with a ghostly feel, Feet Afire, and Bomberos y Bomberas, exploring Latino firefighters' experiences with the supernatural. A 2x finalist for the AFI Women's Directing Workshop and Finalist for the CBS Diversity Producers Mentorship Program. Traveling to 20 countries for business and pleasure fed her passion for cultures and music. While researching for a vampire screenplay work for hire, she discovered Les Daniels' Historical Vampire book series, The Don Sebastian Chronicles. These erudite historical vampire stories seized her interest. Her fascination with history and the supernatural found a perfect partner in the Don Sebastian Chronicles series, set in Spain, Mexico, France, England, and India. Judi called Les at his home and after hearing her ideas, he agreed to option the five books to her. Sadly, Les Daniels passed in 2011, but he sends playful signals to keep her going with the ambitious project, a huge chess piece, an answer to a question found in an old interview, a message in a séance, an idea for a character's motivations in dreams. Les was open to her creative ideas. When he was alive, they spoke on the phone. Judi asked him how Don Sebastian became a vampire-a crucial detail left out in the first book. Les' response? "I never thought about that but you'll figure it out." She did. Many trips to Spain from south to north, east to west, visits to castles, meetings with medieval scholars, research trips to Inquisition museums, armory museums, haunted chapels, mosques, the Alhambra, the Museum of Alchemy in Cordoba, and the ancient synagogue in Girona where Kabbala began, deeply enriched and informed The Black Castle TV series episodes written by Judi for Season One and beyond. The pilot placed as a finalist in several screenwriting contests including Capital Fund Screenplay Competition, which recommends to producers. This passion project is a legacy venture, dedicated to the unsung cultures of Inquisition Spain, The Sephardic Jews, Indian Gitanos/Gypsies, Mystical Moors, and those brave Christians resisting the Inquisition, with the help of a very charismatic, chivalric Knight, Lord and Vampire, Don Sebastian.

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Judi Jordan

Director

Writer

Producer

Costume Designer

Costume Department