Leonie entered the doctoral program in 2016 after completing an M.A. in Performance Studies at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. She also holds a Diploma from Stella Adler Studio of Acting (2012) and a B.A. in Anthropology and Media from Goldsmiths, University of London (2009).
As a theater producer and dramaturg, she has worked with various companies in New York, such as The Living Theatre, The Civilians, and Brave New World Repertory Theatre. In 2013, she was awarded the O1-Visa for individuals with extraordinary abilities in the arts.
Leonie’s research interests include expressionist literature and Brechtian epic theater, Frankfurt School critical theory, and psychoanalysis, particularly trauma studies. Her dissertation explores the 'crisis of authority' in the early 20th-century.
At NYU, her work has been supported by the Provost's GRI Fellowship (2019), the German Department’s Exchange Fellowship with the Free University of Berlin (2019), the Mainzer Summer Fellowship (2021), and the Dean's Dissertation Fellowship (2021-2022).
She has published articles in the collected volume Marxism in the Age of Trump (2018) and the journal Expressionismus (2020). In 2022, her essay “Witnessing Impossibility: The Traumatic Theater of Rachel Neuburger’s Nepenthe” will appear in the Journal of Literature and Trauma Studies.
She is the recipient of NYU’s 2019 Outstanding Teaching Award and the 2020 Alpine Fellowship Academic Writing Prize.