Malaika Fernandes

Malaika Fernandes (she/her/hers) is a Brooklyn-based playwright and arts administrator from Mumbai and a few other places, whose work explores her own ever-changing definition of home. Her plays include MULAQAT (2025 Beyond The Realm, 2025 INK'D Festival, Jane Chambers Student Playwriting Award, Wesleyan University), Banjaara (Workshop Theatre), and Eyebrows On (Horizon Theatre Young Playwrights Festival).

She graduated from Wesleyan University with a BA in Theater and Economics, where she received the Theater Outreach & Community Service Award and the Rachel Henderson Award for Excellence in Theater. Malaika was the 2023-24 Producing & Community Engagement Apprentice at Studio Theatre in Washington, D.C. and a 2024-25 Writing Fellow at The Playwrights Realm. She’s currently the Casting...

Malaika Fernandes (she/her/hers) is a Brooklyn-based playwright and arts administrator from Mumbai and a few other places, whose work explores her own ever-changing definition of home. Her plays include MULAQAT (2025 Beyond The Realm, 2025 INK'D Festival, Jane Chambers Student Playwriting Award, Wesleyan University), Banjaara (Workshop Theatre), and Eyebrows On (Horizon Theatre Young Playwrights Festival).

She graduated from Wesleyan University with a BA in Theater and Economics, where she received the Theater Outreach & Community Service Award and the Rachel Henderson Award for Excellence in Theater. Malaika was the 2023-24 Producing & Community Engagement Apprentice at Studio Theatre in Washington, D.C. and a 2024-25 Writing Fellow at The Playwrights Realm. She’s currently the Casting Assistant at Manhattan Theatre Club.

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Scripts

MULAQAT

by Malaika Fernandes

Cast Size
3
Genre
drama

As her husband’s return from an international work trip becomes indefinitely delayed, Tanya finds herself pregnant and alone in the U.S. Her mother, Damini, rushes from India to take care of her; then her mother-in-law, Noor, comes from Pakistan. They’re supposed to help, but Damini only speaks Marathi and Noor only speaks Urdu — so it falls on Tanya to mediate in English, all while contending with the uncertain...

As her husband’s return from an international work trip becomes indefinitely delayed, Tanya finds herself pregnant and alone in the U.S. Her mother, Damini, rushes from India to take care of her; then her mother-in-law, Noor, comes from Pakistan. They’re supposed to help, but Damini only speaks Marathi and Noor only speaks Urdu — so it falls on Tanya to mediate in English, all while contending with the uncertain path her life will take once the child is born.

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Banjaara

by Malaika Fernandes

Cast Size
5—6
Genre
drama,
holiday

Sabina and Abhinav are on a romantic getaway to India, and everything is perfect. Sabina certainly isn't mourning the loss of her grandmother who passed away the week prior, and Abhinav definitely isn't hiding anything from his girlfriend about the circumstances of his prior move to America. So when Abhinav proposes to Sabina in a desperate attempt to find a home together, nothing can go wrong at all.

Sabina and Abhinav are on a romantic getaway to India, and everything is perfect. Sabina certainly isn't mourning the loss of her grandmother who passed away the week prior, and Abhinav definitely isn't hiding anything from his girlfriend about the circumstances of his prior move to America. So when Abhinav proposes to Sabina in a desperate attempt to find a home together, nothing can go wrong at all.