Novid Parsi

Novid Parsi

Novid Parsi’s plays have been produced or developed by Golden Thread Productions (San Francisco), The New Group (New York), Paines Plough (London), Playwrights Foundation (San Francisco), Queens Theatre (New York), Silk Road Rising (Chicago), and the St. Louis Shakespeare Festival, among others. Novid's plays have been recognized by Ashland New Plays Festival (winner); Bay Area Playwrights Festival (two-...
Novid Parsi’s plays have been produced or developed by Golden Thread Productions (San Francisco), The New Group (New York), Paines Plough (London), Playwrights Foundation (San Francisco), Queens Theatre (New York), Silk Road Rising (Chicago), and the St. Louis Shakespeare Festival, among others. Novid's plays have been recognized by Ashland New Plays Festival (winner); Bay Area Playwrights Festival (two-time finalist and three-time semifinalist); Jeff Awards (Best New Work nominee); New American Voices Playwriting Festival (semifinalist); New Voices, New Plays (finalist); and the O’Neill National Playwrights Conference (four-time semifinalist). Novid earned degrees in literature from Swarthmore College and Duke University, and he lives in St. Louis.

Plays

  • The Life You Gave Me by Novid Parsi
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, drama + 2 more
    Genre: dark comedy, drama, experimental, tragedy
    A son tries to save his mother. She has other ideas, however. So do two mysterious strangers who watch the play—and ask the son to tell the story again and again until he gets it right, whatever right might be.
  • Remains and Returns by Novid Parsi
    Recommendations: 2
    ·
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: family, LGBTQ + 8 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: family, LGBTQ, gay, Iran, Middle East, aging, coming out, Politics, parent-child relationships, bipoc
    In 2018, as the Shirvani family talks about nothing and everything at once, two middle-aged brothers confront their elderly parents about impending realities. Thirty years earlier, in 1988, the parents confront their teen sons about the impending realities of adulthood and their own hopes for their children’s futures. Returning to 2018, Remains and Returns considers how we deny our familial and societal pasts, and how our pasts endure.
  • The Innkeepers by Novid Parsi
    Recommendations: 2
    ·
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: drama, mystery/thriller + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: Chicago, Iranian-American + 6 more
    Genre: drama, mystery/thriller, political
    Keyword: Chicago, Iranian-American, Immigrants, immigration, police, mystery, thriller, bipoc
    Four guests arrive at a remote rural inn for what appears to be a weekend getaway. But the innkeeper, Arzu Amiri, reveals they are all bound together by a terrible event involving her son 17 years earlier. The characters enact and re-enact their shifting versions of what happened until Arzu arrives at her own truth and her own devastating decision.
  • Through the Elevated Line by Novid Parsi
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    7
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: Iran, immigration + 8 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: Iran, immigration, gay, asylum, LGBTQ, Chicago, Streetcar Named Desire, Tennessee Williams, family, bipoc
    Having fled Iran where he was imprisoned for being a gay man, a damaged Razi arrives at his sister’s Chicago doorstep only to disrupt the life she and her American husband have built together. As the Chicago Cubs vie to make history, rivalries of a different kind simmer in the Uptown two-flat that Razi tries to call home. With echoes of A Streetcar Named Desire, Through the Elevated Line probes the boundaries...
    Having fled Iran where he was imprisoned for being a gay man, a damaged Razi arrives at his sister’s Chicago doorstep only to disrupt the life she and her American husband have built together. As the Chicago Cubs vie to make history, rivalries of a different kind simmer in the Uptown two-flat that Razi tries to call home. With echoes of A Streetcar Named Desire, Through the Elevated Line probes the boundaries between family, loss, prejudice, and desire.
  • Take This World by Novid Parsi
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: family, developmental disability + 7 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: family, developmental disability, mother and son, parent-child relationships, Suburbs, color blind, violence, siblings, Mental Health
    Roya has made a name as a writer by chronicling her experience raising her severely impaired son, Nicholas. Now she refuses to acknowledge that, as an adult, the increasingly violent Nicholas may be beyond her—or perhaps anyone's—control.
  • Those Ills We Have by Novid Parsi
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    3
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: pain, Chronic Pain + 8 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: pain, Chronic Pain, Chronic Illness, Relationships, Therapy, Iran, Iranian, Latino, interracial relationships, bipoc
    Farid is in pain, and has been for six years. Now that everything is on the line, can Diego, the pain management guru, help Farid identify the root cause of his pain? Is it his Iranian family’s disappointment in his life choices? Is it the pressures of his interracial marriage? Or is it all just in his head?