Agyeiwaa Asante Wins 2026 IAMA Rhimes Unsung Voices Commission

IAMA Theatre Company has selected Agyeiwaa Asante as the 2026 recipient of the Los Angeles-based theatre company’s The Rhimes Unsung Voices Playwriting Commission.

“Agyeiwaa is a remarkable playwright, who takes the deeply truthful and personal explorations of her characters and makes them beautifully universal,” said IAMA Literary Manager Celia Mandela Rivera. “She is more than deserving of this opportunity and we are thrilled the IAMA community gets to join her on this artistic journey.”

Now in its ninth year, The Rhimes Unsung Voices Playwriting Commission was created to nurture emerging playwrights with an emphasis on cultural inclusion and fresh creativity in theatre. This commission supports a writer from an underrepresented community, who has been minimally professionally produced, but not had a commercial, Off-Broadway, or Broadway production of their work.

Agyeiwaa Asante

is a Ghanaian American playwright and administrator based in the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia area (DMV). Her full-length plays include and have been developed with, DAINTY (BOLD NYC’s 2020 Festival, Mosaic Theatre, Playwrights Realm’s Scratchpad series, Firehouse Theatre), AGAPE; or The Church Play (Cygnet’s Finish Line Commission, Round House’s National Capital New Play Festival, Boston Court Pasadena’s Playwrights Group), and The Half-Sibling Play (Fire This Time Festival, MOXIE Theatre's Lamoise New Works Festival). She holds commissions from the University of Maryland’s NextNow Festival, Single Carrot Theatre, and Round House Theatre. She is the 2020 recipient of The Bret Adams and Paul Reisch Foundation’s Ollie Award and a member of The Kilroys Web 2023 and The Playwrights Cohort at PlayPenn. Asante received her B.A. in Theatre from the University of Maryland, College Park and her M.F.A. in Playwriting from UC San Diego.

Past recipients of The Rhimes Unsung Voices Playwriting Commission include TV writer and playwright Alicia Carroll; IAMA Ensemble Member Brian Otaño; playwright and activist Geraldine Inoa; Iranian-American playwright Sanaz Toossi, who went on to receive a Pulitzer Prize; Obie-winning performer/playwright Ryan J. Haddad; Emmy-nominated writer, director and producer Larry Powell; celebrated actor, director and playwright June Carryl; and Chinese-Canadian playwright, TV writer, screenwriter Chloé Hung.