Yussef El Guindi

Yussef El Guindi’s most recent production was Back of The Throat, winner of the 2004 Northwest Playwright’s Competition held by Theater Schmeater. It won LA Weekly’s Excellence in Playwriting Award for 2006. It was also nominated for the 2006 American Theater Critics Association’s Steinberg/New Play Award, and was voted Best New Play of 2005 by the Seattle Times.  It was first staged by San Francisco’s Thick Description and Golden Thread Productions; then later presented in various theaters around the country including Silk Road Theatre Project, and The Flea Theater in New York. Another play of his, Ten Acrobats in an Amazing Leap of Faith, staged by Silk Road Theatre Project, won the ‘After Dark Award’ for Outstanding New Play in Chicago in 2006.  His two-related one-acts, Acts of Desire, were staged by the Fountain Theatre in Los Angeles . Back of the Throat, and the two related one-acts, now titled, Such a Beautiful Voice is Sayeda’s and Karima’s City, have been published by Dramatists Play Service. The latter one-acts have also been included in The Best American Short Plays: 2004 – 2005 to be published by Applause Books in 2008. El Guindi holds an MFA from Carnegie-Mellon University and was playwright-in-residence at Duke University. In 2007, El Guindi became Silk Road Theatre Project’s first-ever Resident Playwright.