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Betty Shamieh

Author of The Black Eyed. Fit for a Queen, and Roar, Betty Shamieh is currently the Mellon Foundation Playwright in Residence at the Classical Theatre of Harlem. To receive her e-newsletter, visit https://www.bettyshamieh.com/contact

Betty Shamieh is an Arab American writer and the Mellon Foundation Playwright in Residence at the Classical Theatre of Harlem. Her play MALVOLIO, an irreverent comedy and sequel to TWELFTH NIGHT, was a New York Times Critics Pick and premiered as part of the Classical Theatre of Harlem’s Uptown Shakespeare in the Park series at the Richard Rodgers Amphitheatre (July 2023). Her other productions include THE BLACK EYED (New York Theatre Workshop), FIT FOR A QUEEN (Classical Theatre of Harlem), THE MACHINE (Naked Angels), THE STRANGEST (The Semitic Root), TERRITORIES (Magic Theatre & the EU Capital of Culture Festival), and ROAR (The New Group). Shamieh wrote and co-starred in her play of monologues, CHOCOLATE IN HEAT, in two extended off-off-Broadway runs and over twenty university theatres. A graduate of Harvard College and the Yale School of Drama, Shamieh was named a UNESCO Young Artist for Intercultural Dialogue and Radcliffe Playwriting Fellow. She was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship for Drama in 2016. Recently, she received an Advancing Culture Change grant from Noor Theatre with support from Pop Culture Collab to adapt ROAR into a tv pilot and was a Denning Visiting Artist at Stanford. Her works have been translated into seven languages. Shamieh’s debut novel NOT PROMISING ANYTHING will be published by Avid Reader Press, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, in 2025. Follow her on Facebook, Tiktok, Twitter or Instagram @bettyshamieh. www.bettyshamieh.com

A woman facing her back to three men and another woman.
The Mother of All Emotions
Essay

The Mother of All Emotions

7 December 2021

Playwright, author, screenwriter, and actor Betty Shamieh discusses her experience navigating the complexities of new motherhood as a woman in the theatre industry.

three actors onstage
We’ve Seen White American Theatre
Essay

We’ve Seen White American Theatre

How Can We BIPOC Now See Ourselves?

2 July 2020

Betty Shamieh offers a response to the “We See You, White American Theater” open letter as a non-Black American of color.