Aja Nisenson

Aja Nisenson

AJA NISENSON is a playwright and performer originating from New Jersey. Her plays include: Slap (Take Ten, National MFA Playwrights Festival), Park Slope Under Water ( Iowa New Play Festival), The Wait (Iowa New Play Festival), Funk (Iowa Playwrights Workshop), Piccola Cosi (FringeNYC, soloNOVA Arts Festival, Triad Theatre), Daja Vu, A French Cabaret Gone Awry, (Eugene O’Neill Cabaret Conference, FringeNYC,...
AJA NISENSON is a playwright and performer originating from New Jersey. Her plays include: Slap (Take Ten, National MFA Playwrights Festival), Park Slope Under Water ( Iowa New Play Festival), The Wait (Iowa New Play Festival), Funk (Iowa Playwrights Workshop), Piccola Cosi (FringeNYC, soloNOVA Arts Festival, Triad Theatre), Daja Vu, A French Cabaret Gone Awry, (Eugene O’Neill Cabaret Conference, FringeNYC, Flute Bar Gramercy) My Life  is a Woody Allen Film (United Solo Theatre Festival, EstroGenius Festival), Five Years Later (Salem Theatre). Her play Love was part of the 2020 Kennedy Center MFA Workshop. She is a MacDowell fellow and has held fellowships at the Eugene O’Neill Cabaret Conference and The Marble House Project. She is published in Theater Masters’ Take Ten Vol.4 with Samuel French, and received the Jane Chambers Student Playwright Award. Aja received her BA from Brown University and MFA at the Iowa Playwrights Workshop.

Plays

  • Love by Aja Nisenson
    Cast: 
    3
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: bittersweet love story, elderly + 2 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, drama
    Keyword: bittersweet love story, elderly, sexual abuse survivor, grandmother/granddaughter relationship
    Love investigates what true intimacy and love means later in life. When Phoebe (30's), sets her grandmother Em (80’s) up on a blind date with Walt (80's), the two "kids" hit it off, developing a courtship role-playing game in which their past traumas get re-imagined into their present. Playing the role of their respective deceased spouses, the two elders enact each other’s pasts in order to...
    Love investigates what true intimacy and love means later in life. When Phoebe (30's), sets her grandmother Em (80’s) up on a blind date with Walt (80's), the two "kids" hit it off, developing a courtship role-playing game in which their past traumas get re-imagined into their present. Playing the role of their respective deceased spouses, the two elders enact each other’s pasts in order to heal the memory and process their grief. The play asks the questions: Who says women in their 80’s can’t have the best sex of their lives? And can sexual awakening open us up to accepting, or at least acknowledging past sexual trauma as a way to heal?
  • Why Is This Night Different? by Aja Nisenson
    Cast: 
    8
    ·
    Genre: comedy, drama
    ·
    Keyword: female sexual awakening, Jewish Judaism Queer + 6 more
    Genre: comedy, drama
    Keyword: female sexual awakening, Jewish Judaism Queer, LGBTQ, queer, bisexuality, female playwright, family, mother and daughter
    It is the first night of Passover, and Haley is introducing her parents to her boyfriend, who is not only 20 years older, but also $150,000 in debt. Things get even more complicated when Mom reveals a secret that shakes the established order, and forces the family to confront the past and move forward into the future. A bold and irreverent comedy about a Mother’s coming-of-age at 65.
  • Slap by Aja Nisenson
    Cast: 
    3
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy
    ·
    Keyword: mother daughter relationship, dysfunctional family + 3 more
    Genre: dark comedy
    Keyword: mother daughter relationship, dysfunctional family, physical abuse, children and parents, marriage
    A mother tries to provoke her daughter to slap her in the face in order to even out the swelling of Mom's latest cosmetic procedure. Sometimes love hurts
  • Park Slope Under Water by Aja Nisenson
    Cast: 
    3
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy
    ·
    Keyword: female playwright, marriage and intimacy + 6 more
    Genre: dark comedy
    Keyword: female playwright, marriage and intimacy, single mother, mental illness, female writers, adult relationships, male vulnerability, midlife crisis
    Richard, mid 60's, (a Pulitzer-prize winning author living alone in a rent-stabilized apartment in Park Slope, NYC) meets Seattle, early 30's, and instantly falls in love, despite Seattle's insistence on not defining what they are. When Lily, a nine year old girl arrives at his doorstep, Richard is forced to confront his past and re-examine his present.
  • The Wait by Aja Nisenson
    Cast: 
    9–13
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, drama + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: Jewish Family, coming to terms with death + 5 more
    Genre: dark comedy, drama, experimental, fantasy
    Keyword: Jewish Family, coming to terms with death, family, sibling conflict, comic surrealism, dark comedy, death of parents
    Papa is on his deathbed. A comedic and tragic look at what it means to lose and become your parent, and how death brings out the best and worst in all of us.
  • Spring Lake by Aja Nisenson
    Cast: 
    3
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy
    ·
    Keyword: elderly, a mother's love + 3 more
    Genre: dark comedy
    Keyword: elderly, a mother's love, argument with mother, son, family
    A middle-aged son comes home to check on his elderly mother, after elder abuse from a caregiver, only to discover that his mom is the one doing the illegal activity.  A dark comedy about a woman in her late 80's who finally finds her passion for living.
  • Funk by Aja Nisenson
    Cast: 
    6
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy
    ·
    Keyword: funk music, Dysfunctional Friendships + 3 more
    Genre: dark comedy
    Keyword: funk music, Dysfunctional Friendships, bromance, touring band, angels
    A touring funk band is camped out in a Ramada Hotel off the highway in Pennsylvania waiting for their big break. Truths reveal themselves, as simmering unrest surfaces and the band must decide its next step.