Maha Chehlaoui News

After years with the company, Noor Theatre's Founding Artistic Director Lameece Issaq and Managing Director Megan Patterson will now say goodbye after a year-long transition, culminating in the hiring of Ariana Sarfarazi as Noor's Executive Director.

Difficult, but welcome discussions about race and representation continue to spread through the theatre landscape. Yesterday, a group of Middle Eastern and Muslim theater artists from Noor Theatre and elsewhere released a letter expressing concern about Playwrights Horizons' current production of Zayd Dohrn's THE PROFANE. Playwrights Horizons has responded today with a call for public discussion and further collaboration.

On Monday, September 21, 2015 The Innovative Theatre Foundation, the organization who for the past 11 years has been dedicated to celebrating Off-Off-Broadway, announced the 2015 recipients at its annual event. Celebrating eleven years and thousands of nominees, the New York Innovative Theatre awards took place at Mason Hall at Baruch Performing Arts Center.

On Monday, July 20, 2015, The New York Innovative Theatre Foundation, the organization who for the past 11 years has been dedicated to celebrating Off-Off-Broadway, announced the 2015 nominees at its annual event, The IT Party. Celebrating eleven years and thousands of nominees at DIAMOND HORSESHOE, home of Queen of the Night, 235 West 46th Street, 7pm-10pm.

Join us for an evening with Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Ayad Akhtar, with Neilesh Bose (St. John's University) and Maha Chehlaoui (Noor Theatre), on Monday, April 13 at 6:30pm at The Segal Theatre, The Graduate Center CUNY.

The Martin E. Segal Theatre Center at the CUNY Graduate Center announces its Spring 2015 season of public programs. The Segal Center's 2015 Spring season offers ten new public events beginning on March 9 -- featuring contemporary theatre and performing artists from around the world -- including the annual three-day PEN World Voices International Play Festival, and retrospectives of the work of formidable American artists Lee Breur and Richard Foreman. All free.

Join us for an evening investigating contemporary Arab American Theatre and for the launch of the new Segal Center journal, Arab Stages, by Editor-in-Chief, Marvin Carlson. 'Towards an Arab American Theatre' will present readings, panels, screenings and a book celebration for free on Monday, December 8.

Troubled by the news here at home and coming out of the Middle East, Noor Theatre's leadership grappled with how to engage artistically and meaningfully with the world around them. Their programming is a direct response to these questions - questions that they look to their community of artists and audience to help answer.

If it is your intention to find your way out of a normal theatre or conventional black box you should find your way to The Invisible Dog. The raw and deconstructed space in Brooklyn on Bergen St. is showing 'And if You Lose Your Way, or A Food Odyssey. The play, consisting of small ensemble cast, is a adaptation of the story of Penelope and Odysseus from Homer's the Odyssey. However, in this telling the past is interwoven with the present in sometimes surreal and candid moments.

If we are what we eat, what are we? What is America's food culture, and where is it heading? And ultimately, how does food connect us?

Noor Theatre Artistic Director Lameece Issaq, Executive Director Maha Chehlaoui, and Producing Artistic Director Nancy Vitale announce the world premiere of The Myth Project. This director-driven workshop production in three parts from Director/Writers Kareem Fahmy, Noelle Ghoussaini, and Pirronne Yousefzadeh, will run from tonight, May 1 - Sunday, May 4 at New York Theatre Workshop's 4th Street Theatre.

A diverse cast of thirteen join Noor Theatre Artistic Director Lameece Issaq, Executive Director Maha Chehlaoui, and Producing Artistic Director Nancy Vitale for the world premiere of The Myth Project. This director-driven workshop production in three parts from Director/Writers Kareem Fahmy, Noelle Ghoussaini, and Pirronne Yousefzadeh, runs in repertory from Thursday, May 1 through Sunday, May 4 at New York Theatre Workshop's 4th Street Theatre.

A diverse cast of thirteen join Noor Theatre Artistic Director Lameece Issaq, Executive Director Maha Chehlaoui, and Producing Artistic Director Nancy Vitale for the world premiere of The Myth Project. This director-driven workshop production in three parts from Director/Writers Kareem Fahmy, Noelle Ghoussaini, and Pirronne Yousefzadeh, runs in repertory from Thursday, May 1 through Sunday, May 4 at New York Theatre Workshop's 4th Street Theatre.

Noor Theatre Artistic Director Lameece Issaq, Executive Director Maha Chehlaoui, and Producing Artistic Director Nancy Vitale announce the world premiere of The Myth Project. This director-driven workshop production in three parts from Director/Writers Kareem Fahmy, Noelle Ghoussaini, and Pirronne Yousefzadeh, will run from Thursday, May 1 - Sunday, May 4 at New York Theatre Workshop's 4th Street Theatre.

Noor Theatre's Highlight Reading Series concludes Monday, November 18 at 7:30pm with House of Strength by Rahaleh Nassri and directed by Sarna Lapine.

Noor Theatre's Highlight Reading Series continues this Monday at 7:30pm with an excerpt of The Shadow Spirit, by Ibn Daniyal. Written in Cairo in the 13th century, this saucy, satirical piece offers a raucous glimpse into medieval Cairo's underworld of pimps, prostitutes and dirty dealings. This is a rare opportunity to hear one of Egypt's earliest secular plays, which was written by a contemporary of Chaucer.

Noor Theatre opens the 2013-2014 Season with the return of the fall play-reading series, Highlight, followed by a co-production with the Rutgers/New Jersey Institute of Technology Theatre program in December, and the next phase of The Myth Project in the Spring.

Fadwa Faranesh, a bright, engaging Palestinian woman living in Bethlehem, hosts a cooking program from her home kitchen, where she prepares delectable dishes like tabouli and baba ghanoush in the traditional manner the women of her culture have been preparing them for centuries.  To her, food is an important connection between the past and the present.