​is a playwright and choreographer from the Sicangu Lakota Nation.  She started her career as a very rare Native American ballet dancer from South Dakota, but she always loved to write.  After injuries forced Larissa to stand still, she worked in the film and TV industry as an executive and writer but missed the collaboration of theatre.  Then a commission and production of AVERAGE FAMILY from the Tony Award winning Children’s Theatre Company of Minneapolis brought her home, and she hasn’t left since. 



Larissa’s second commission with Children’s Theatre Company, FANCY DANCER based on her life story, won the 2010 National Endowment for the Arts Distinguished New Play Development Grant.  It is in development to be directed by Peter Brosius.



An Equity production of TEACHING DISCO SQUAREDANCING TO OUR ELDERS: A CLASS PRESENTATION, was the first of three commissions with Native Voices at the Autry in Los Angeles, the country’s leading producer of new Native American plays.  Currently Larissa is under commission with the Kennedy Center Theatre for Young Audiences for A DANCING PEOPLE, which will bring together her dance and writing backgrounds into a blend of text and movement.   Her newest play, HUNKA, has been invited to be a part of Arizona Theatre Company’s inaugural Café Bohemia season. 



Additionally Larissa is under commission with Cornerstone Theatre Company, AlterTheater and Cherokee Historical Association who will premier her new play, CHEROKEE FAMILY REUNION, in July 2012.  Larissa is a member of the Center Theatre Group Writer’s Workshop 2011-12.



Larissa has been the choreographer for UNTO THESE HILLS in Cherokee NC from 2008-11.  Selected awards include the Center Theatre Group 2011-12 Writer’s Workshop, Aurand Harris Fellowship, a two time Ford New Works grant recipient, Sundance Fellowship, National Geographic Seed Grant and inscribed delegate to the UN in Geneva.  TV credits include two pilots; THE LINE for Fox and LAKOTA FALLS for Teen Nick.



Larissa’s plays may be found with Dramatic Publishing, Plays for Young Audiences, the Native American Women Playwrights Archive at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, and in the Alexander Street Press North American Indian Drama Database.  Larissa currently resides in Santa Monica CA with her husband, sculptor Edd Hogan.  www.hoganhorsestudio.com