Kellie Madison

Madison began her career as an actress having minor roles in several films, such as 2000's Under the Bus and 2001's The Rest of Your Life.[5] In 2002, Madison realized her desire to move beyond acting and began to write, produce, and eventually direct films.[6]

One of Madison's first ventures in screenwriting took place when she wrote the screenplay for the aforementioned Dear Mr. Gacy, adapted from the Jason Moss' book, The Last Victim.[7] Additionally, she claimed to have grown up down the street from John Wayne Gacy in Chicago, Illinois.[8] Bearing the same name as her screenplay, the film about the serial killer was developed and produced with the assistance of Clark Peterson, the executive producer of Monster.[9] Unfortunately, Moss—who Madison was in negotiations with regarding the film—committed suicide during production, leaving Madison to re-negotiate with his widow.[10]

Sometime during the mid-2000s, Madison discovered that one of her close friends had obsessive-compulsive disorder, which enticed her to learn more about it via Replay Rewind Repeat: A Memoir of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder by Jeff Bell.[11] Based on her growing interest for awareness of the disorder, Madison wrote the screenplay for Machine Man, a film about the struggles of OCD.[12] Her primary reason for writing the screenplay was to educate audiences on a topic that she feels has not been properly addressed with a goal of removing the stigma associated with it.[11] Producer and actor Craig James Pietrowiak (International Screenwriter Association) had similar interests in the topic and joined Madison to support the creation of the film.[13] A Kickstarter campaign was put in place to raise $225,000 and fund the film, but only $12,903 was donated and the effort was ultimately unsuccessful.[14] As of today, it is unclear what production stage Machine Man is in and if it is still in development.

In 2011, Madison became involved with the Tomorrow/Bokra production team as a co-producer for the Arabic charity single.[15][16]

In 2013, Madison was a finalist in the Project Imaginat10n film contest in which contestants created shorts films based on a selection of crowdsourced photographs, all of which were judged by Ron Howard and Bryce Dallas Howard.[17] Her submission for the contest was The Caul, a short film that Madison wrote and directed about two twins born in the caul who gain supernatural abilities.[18] During the same year, Madison signed with Zero Gravity Management just after she began to work on Hotel 33, a mystery about the 1953 events surrounding the Grand Hotel in Williamsport, PA that Nicolas Cage was rumoured to be attached to.[19][20] Like Machine Man, the fate of Hotel 33 remains unclear.

More recently, Madison worked with Ohio-based Big River Studios where she took on both writing and directing responsibilities for 2015's The Tank, her feature directorial debut about a failed Mars simulation trip.[21][22] The thriller is planned to be distributed by Open Road Films.[2]

In 2021, Madison directed Never Back Down: Revolt, the fourth installment in the Never Back Down franchise.

She is currently based in Los Angeles, California, where her production company, Madison Films, is established.[23]