Writers
A.A BRENNER (they/them/he)
A.A. Brenner (they / them / he) is a playwright, dramaturg, actor, and New Yorker. Their writing blends naturalistic dialogue with heightened realism to explore queer, trans, Jewish, and Disability themes, challenging both societal power structures and theatrical form. A.A.'s plays have been presented or commissioned by La Jolla Playhouse, National Disability Theatre, Lincoln Center, Queens Theatre, CO/LAB Theatre Group, Shakespeare Theatre Company (Fellows Consortium), Three Muses Theatre Company, Young Playwrights Inc., The Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts, Columbia University, and The Hangar Theatre Lab Company; their play for all audiences, EMILY DRIVER'S GREAT RACE THROUGH TIME AND SPACE (co-written by Gregg Mozgala), was featured on the 2020 Kilroys List. Additionally, A.A. was a Finalist for the 2020-22 Apothetae & Lark Playwriting Fellowship, the Platform Presents 2021 Playwright's Prize and the 2021 Columbia@Roundabout New Play Reading Series, and has been a writer-in-residence at New York Stage and Film's 2021 Summer Season and The Lark's Beyond the Binary initiative for trans and nonbinary writers. Currently, A.A. lives on Lenape land in Brooklyn, NY, and is a 2022 graduate of the MFA Playwriting Program at Columbia University School of the Arts. | Website: www.aabrenner.com
AZURE D. OSBORNE-LEE (he/they)
Azure D. Osborne-Lee (he/they) is a multi-award-winning Black queer & trans theatre maker from south of the Mason-Dixon Line. He holds an MA in Advanced Theatre Practice (2011) from Royal Central School of Speech & Drama as well as an MA in Women’s & Gender Studies (2008) and a BA in English & Spanish from The University of Texas at Austin (2005). Azure teaches at The New School and New York University. He is the founder of Roots and River Productions. Waterwell New Works Lab’s 2021 Commission, Kilroys List 2020 playwright, recipient of Parity Productions’ 2018 Annual Commission, Winner of Downtown Urban Arts Festival’s 2018 Best Play Award, and 2015 Mario Fratti-Fred Newman Political Play Contest. azureosbornelee.com
BIANCA LEIGH
Bianca Leigh. Miss Leigh’s acting roles include Waxy Bush in MTC’s THE NAP on Broadway (Understudy/performed), Mary Ellen in the groundbreaking film TRANSAMERICA, Time/Wind in Taylor Mac’s theatre epic THE LILY’S REVENGE, Franny Halcyon in the New York and San Francisco workshops of TALES OF THE CITY THE MUSICAL (performed in concert at the Music Box Theatre), Tatiana in Paul Lucas’ award- winning verbatim piece TRANS SCRIPTS at American Repertory Theatre, Beatrice in Christina Anderson’s MAN IN LOVE at Kansas City Rep, and Dr. Rachel Sandow on LAW & ORDER: SVU. Her play, MBJrT, was part of the Monday Night Playwright Series at Kansas City Rep in 2018. She is featured in Laverne Cox’s documentary DISCLOSURE, an exploration of Trans representation in motion pictures and on television, and can be heard on the Audible recording CHONBURI INTERNATIONAL HOTEL AND BUTTERFLY CLUB.
ELSE WENT (they/she)
Else Went (they/she) is a Brooklyn based playwright and sound designer whose work often deals with the formation and continuance of outsider communities. Their work has been incubated in groups at The Public Theatre (EWG), Ars Nova (Play Group), WP (Trans Lab), Playwrights Realm (Fellow), and Bechdel Group (Resident Artist). Fellow at MacDowell, Stillwright, and Barn Arts. Commissions include the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation with MTC (An Oxford Man), Weston Playhouse (Mirror Game; short), and Parity Productions (Boxcar). Else's plays have been finalists and semifinalists for the O'Neill, Princess Grace, ASC's Shakespeare's New Contemporaries, and the Carlo Annoni Prize, among others. Her work has been previously developed with The Tank, International Shakespeare Center, Florida Studio Theatre, and The Brick. Else is the co-founder and playwright of The Renovationists, an artistic collective dedicated to queering traditional modes of theatre, with whom they developed and presented the plays Boxcar, Three Seconds, Old Names for Wildflowers, Initiative, and Courage! to the Field!
ISAAC GÓMEZ (they/them)
Isaac Gómez (she/they/he) is an award-winning Chicago and Los Angeles based playwright and screenwriter originally from El Paso, Texas/Ciudad Juárez, Mexico. They identify as na’wi – the third gender marker of the Rarámuri, a Mexican indigenous community in northern Chihuahua, of which she is a direct descendent. He is currently under commission with LCT3, Steppenwolf Theater Company, South Coast Repertory, Denver Center for the Performing Arts, and IAMA Theatre Company. Their plays have been produced and/or developed by Audible Theater, Steppenwolf Theater Company, Primary Stages, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Goodman Theatre, the Alley Theatre, and many others. She is the recipient of the 2018 Dramatists Guild Lanford Wilson Award, the 2017 Jeffry Melnick New Playwright Award at Primary Stages, and an inaugural 3Arts “Make A Wave” grantee. His television credits include the Netflix Original Series ‘Narcos: Mexico’, the upcoming Apple TV+ Limited Series ‘The Last Thing He Told Me’ starring Jennifer Garner, and the second season of the crime-drama ‘Joe Picket’ for Paramount TV+. They currently have a series in development with Stacey Sher and FX. On the feature side, she is currently under development with a full-length feature at Focus Features. They enjoy good bowls of menudo on Sundays (con bolillos not tortillas, porfis) and can slay a game of millennial loteria. He is represented by The Gersh Agency, ReDefine Entertainment, and Granderson Des Rochers, LLP. Isaac resides in Los Angeles, CA with his fiancé, cat (Tuxedo) and miniature schnauzer (Zuni).
KAELA MEI-SHING GARVIN (they/she)
Kaela Mei-Shing Garvin (they/she) is a writer, performer, educator, and new work advocate. Plays include Call Out Culture (2022 O'Neill National Playwrights Conference Finalist, 2019 Ars Nova’s ANTFest), Harpers Ferry 2019 (2022 Know Theatre of Cincinnati production, 2021 Kendeda Playwriting Award finalist), Tiger Beat (2021 Bay Area Playwrights Festival, 2021 Seven Devils Conference finalist), and The Well-Tempered Clavier (2020 BAPF finalist, 2019 Paul Stephen Lim Award.) Kaela has received six Kennedy Center awards and has developed work with the Alliance Theater, The Road’s Under Construction Lab, the Coop’s Clusterf*ck, Playground-NY, and Pipeline Theater Company’s Playlab. Commissions include work with Montana Repertory Theater and College of the Holy Cross. Garvin is the BAPF Season 45 Play Selection Advisor, the Tank’s 2022 Pridefest curator, and a founding member of Undiscovered Countries, a Brooklyn-based incubator of new interdisciplinary art. Kaela currently teaches playwriting at Cornish College of the Arts and is the Literary Manager for Luna Stage in New Jersey. www.kaelameishinggarvin.com
LADY DANE FIGUEROA EDIDI (she/her)
Dubbed the Ancient Jazz Priestess of Mother Africa, Lady Dane Figueroa Edidi is a Black Nigerian, Cuban, Indigenous, American Performance Artist, Author, Educator, a Helen Hayes Award winning Playwright (Klytmnestra: An Epic Slam Poem), a 2021 Helen Merrill Award Winner, Advocate, Dramaturg, a 2x Helen Hayes Award Nominated choreographer (2016, 2018) and co-editor/co-founder of the Black Trans Prayer Book.
She is the curator and associate producer of Long Wharf Theatre’s Black Trans Women At The Center: An Evening of Short Plays, as well as an artistic ensemble member of the theater. She wrote episode 1 of Untitled Mockumentary Project and acted on the series as well, and wrote episode 9 (Refuge) of Round House Theater’s web series Homebound. She was recently featured as Dr. Grace Grace in the webseries I Need Space. She also narrated The Netflix Docu-series Visions of Us.
LIQING XU (they/she)
Liqing Xu (they/she) is a playwright and screenwriter. Their work has been developed/supported by Theater Mu, Second Stage, the María Irene Fornés Institute Writers Workshop, The Orchard Project, and the Sewanee Writers' Conference (as a Walter E. Dakin Fellow), among others. They are a proud inaugural member of the Mu Tang Clan. Liqing is a Semi-Finalist for the 2022-2023 Princess Grace Award. Currently, she is based in Minneapolis as a Playwrights' Center 2022-2023 Many Voices Fellow. BFA: NYU, Film and Television. MFA: Hunter College, Playwriting.
MASHUQ MUSHTAQ DEEN (he/they)
Mashuq Mushtaq Deen is a former resident playwright at New Dramatists, a CORE writer at the Playwrights Center, and winner of the Lambda Literary Award for Draw the Circle (productions: PlayMakers Rep, Mosaic Theatre, Rattlestick Playwrights Theatre). His other full-length plays include The Empty Place (produced by NYU), Flood (world premiere, Kansas City Rep 2023), The Betterment Society (published by Methuen Books), and The Shaking Earth (covid-canceled world premiere, National Queer Theater 2021; First-Runner-Up for both the International Woodward Prize, and the India's International Sulthan Padamsee Prize).
Deen’s work has been presented/developed/supported by a number of institutions including the Siena Art Institute, Sundance Theatre Institute & the Ucross Foundation, Blue Mountain Center, The Public Theater, NYTW, MacDowell Colony, Bogliasco Foundation, Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, Keen Company, Target Margin Theatre, NYU, La Jolla Playhouse, New Harmony Project, Chesley/Bumbalo Foundation, Arch and Bruce Brown Foundation, SPACE at Ryder Farm, New York Foundation for the Arts, InterAct Theatre, Page73, Ma-Yi, Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics, Georgetown University, BEAT Festival, PACE University, Hampshire College, Averett University, Dixon Place, Passage Theatre, Queens Theatre in the Park, Tofte Lake Center, and the Berkshire Fringe Festival.
He is a member of the NYTW Usual Suspects, Ma-Yi Writers Lab, and co-founder of the Public Theater Alumni Writers Group. He earned his MFA from the Actors Studio Drama School/New School for Drama. He is represented by the Gurman Agency LLC and is a member of the Dramatists Guild.
SAM HAMASHIMA (they/them)
Described as “serious whimsy” in the Washington Post, Hamashima (they/them) creates theater with an emphasis on spectacle, surprise, and design. Full-length plays include: American Spies (Washington, D.C., The Hub Theatre, Helen Hayes Recommended, Winner of the 2018 Kennedy Center Undergraduate Playwriting Award and the University of Michigan Hopwood Award in Drama, Dennis McIntyre Prize, and The Roy Cowden Fellowship), Supposed Home (TheatreWorks Silicon Valley, Bay Area Playwrights Festival, Seattle Public Theater), and Shoyu Tell (Lexington Children’s Theatre). Hamashima’s work has been presented and/or developed by the Kennedy Center, Stanford University, National Queer Theater, Lyric Stage Boston, and the Workshop Theater. They are the 2nd recipient of Seattle Public Theater’s $10,000 Emerald Prize. Currently under commission with San Francisco Playhouse. University of Michigan’s Musical Theatre Program.
SHARIFA YASMIN (she/her)
Sharifa Yasmin (she/her) is a trans Egyptian-American director, actress and playwright. She has completed fellowships with The Drama League, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Manhattan Theatre Club, Geva Theatre, and was a Eugene O’Neill national directing fellow. Her plays have been produced with the Bay Area Playwrights Festival, Uprising Theatre, Amphibian Stage, Trans Theatre Fest, Women’s Theatre Festival, taught at DePaul, Susquehanna, and Kansas Universities, and published in The Methuen Drama Book of Trans Plays. Yasmin was honored as the inaugural recipient of the SCDF Barbara Whitman Award in 2021. She is completing her MFA in Directing with Brown/Trinity Rep. www.sharifayasmin.com
SYLVAN OSWALD (he/him)
Sylvan Oswald (he/him) is a writer who creates text-based projects exploring trans identity, history, and nonviolent dramaturgy. Sylvan started writing roles for gender nonconforming people in 2000 - starting with the idea of a pants role. As he and his work grew, he included roles for butch, trans, and nonbinary performers. His projects include Trainers: A Theatrical Essay (Gate Theatre, London and Oberon Books); High Winds (TBA Festival, Fusebox Festival, X Artists' Books), "Towards a Trans Theater," an essay forthcoming from Bloomsbury, "Cut Piece", a personal history of play publishing; Play A Journal of Plays (2003-2011); and Outtakes, a web series. Plays include A Kind of Weather (Diversionary Theater, San Diego), Vendetta Chrome (Clubbed Thumb), and Pony (About Face Theater, Chicago). A recipient of a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship for 2019-20, a Soho Rep Dorothy Strelsin Fellowship, a Jerome Fellowship, and residencies at MacDowell and UCross, Sylvan now heads the playwriting program at UCLA. sylvanoswald.xyz
TIMOTHY DUWHITE (pronoun inclusive)
Timothy DuWhite, also known as Ungrateful Black Artist (UGBA) is a queer poet, playwright, actor, and activist. UGBA is the founder/host of CEREMONIES, a Brooklyn based monthly Black-Queer artist showcase held in honor of Essex Hemphill. UGBA is a BAM Resident Artist, a member of the Public Theater’s Emerging Writers Group, and alumni of The Public Theater's #BARS Workshop. His essays and poetry can be found in The Rumpus, The Root, THEM, Afropunk, Black Youth Project, The Grio, and elsewhere.
TRAVIS L. TATE (they/them)
travis tate (they/them) is a queer, Black playwright, poet and performer living in Brooklyn. Their poetry has appeared in Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, Underblong, Southern Humanities Review, Vassar Review, The Broiler and Cosmonaut Avenue, among other journals. Their debut poetry collection, MAIDEN, was published on Vegetarian Alcoholic Press in June 2020. The world premiere of Queen of The Night happened at Dorset Theatre Festival in August 2021 and had its second production at Victory Gardens Theatre in January 2022. They earned an MFA in Creative Writing from the Michener Center for Writers. You can find more about them at travisltate.com.
VICTOR I. CAZARES (they/them)
Victor I. Cazares (they/them) is a non-binary Poz Queer Indigenous Mexican Artist (enby PQIMA for short) who has had stints at Yale, Brown and other less prestigious centers of rehabilitation. Like any border child, they were born twice: once in El Paso, Texas and another in San Lorenzo, Chihuahua. During the pandemic, Victor debuted virtually at Carnegie Hall as part of the Voices of Hope Festival in partnership with National Queer Theater and The LGBT Center. They also teach a tuition-free class for emerging immigrant playwrights as part of PEN America’s DREAMing Out Loud program. Plays include: american (tele)visions and Pinching Pennies with Penny Marshall (NYTW); Ramses contra los monstruos, We Were Eight Years in Powder and «when we write with ashes» (NQT and Lincoln Center Restart Stages). Victor is currently the Tow Playwright-in-Residence at New York Theatre Workshop.