Close to Home

Playwright

Sharifa Yasmin

Sharifa Yasmin (she/her) is a trans Egyptian-American director and playwright. She has completed directing fellowships with The Drama League, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Manhattan Theatre Club, Geva Theatre, and is a Eugene O’Neill national directing fellow. Sharifa’s favorite directing projects include The War Boys (Hangar Theater), 3:59AM (Actors Theatre of Louisville), In the Blood (Duende Productions), Mosque4Mosque (National Queer Theatre) and Beirut (Brown/Trinity Rep). Sharifa’s playwriting focuses on the intersection of Queer and Arab identities. Her plays have been produced with Uprising Theatre, Amphibian Stage, Trans Theatre Fest, Mirrorbox Theatre, 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 currently serves as a member of The Drama League’s Directors Council, and is completing her MFA in Directing with Brown/Trinity Rep.