Meet Yayabell!
FINALIST - HOUR PILOT & HALF-HOUR PILOT
FINALIST - HOUR PILOT & HALF-HOUR PILOT
She/Her
Television Track
Teen Drama, Supernatural Thrillers, New Adult Comedy
BIO:
Yayabell Debay is a Los Angeles based screenwriter who spent much of her childhood growing up abroad in Ethiopia. She earned her BA in Theatre Arts with minors in Creative Writing and French from Pepperdine University.
Her work lives in two worlds. One is girl meets monsters: sci-fi, fantasy, horror, and psychological thrillers, survival stories where the monsters are never just monsters, and the supernatural becomes a mirror for human fear and desire. Think Jordan Peele or Guillermo del Toro. The other world is rooted in teen drama and the golden age of The CW, shows like Gossip Girl, The Vampire Diaries, and Veronica Mars that shaped her love of heightened emotion, mystery, and messy ambition.
Yayabell loves to write stories centered on complicated, driven Black women, whether they’re battling literal monsters, figuring out who they are, or trying to explain to their mother why they’re still single at 26 with no prospects in sight.
She has industry experience working as a Production Assistant and most recently as a Script Coordinator on a hit Netflix series. When she’s not writing, she can be found hunting for the best tacos (currently Angels Tijuana Tacos) or planning her next trip to some new and exciting place.
Showcase Scripts:
THE RETREAT - Hour Pilot - Drama/Horror/Thriller- Finalist
A once-celebrated author attends a remote writer’s retreat to overcome her writer’s block, only to discover that the guests are disappearing and returning as something not entirely human.
MEET THE GREENS - Half-Hour Pilot - Comedy/Action/Family - Finalist
Two rival spies go undercover as a family in Silicon Valley to steal a dangerous piece of technology, but when their personal baggage threatens the mission, failure could mean global disaster.
HORSEPOWER - Hour Pilot - Drama/International
A Black female racer from Texas, training to go pro, is accepted into an elite European driver program only to be thrust into the ruthless and dangerous world of professional motorsport.