We’re excited to announce the 2026 Creation Lab Playwrights: Yasna Khademian and Medha Gautham! Through the Lab, Yasna and Medha will be receiving mentorship from our dramaturgy team (Leslie Dos Remedios and Kamila Sediego), group and one-on-one sessions, 2 local writing residencies, and artist-designed workshops. Stay tuned for their work-in-progress presentations later this year!
Yasna Khademian – Takht-e Jamshid
Yasna Khademian is a playwright whose work centres on intergenerational dynamics, relationships between women, and chosen family. Her writing has been supported and publicly shared by theatre companies across the country – including Teesri Duniya Theatre, Playwrights Theatre Centre, and the Arts Club – and is premiering at the Or Festival 6. Born in the Midwest as a second-generation Iranian in the diaspora, Yasna’s writing is deeply informed by themes related to immigration and the intersections of gender, sexuality, race, and class. She is currently developing Takht-e Jamshid, a full-length play set at a dinner party in the Iranian diaspora, where open secrets and cover-ups threaten to destroy a community’s social fabric and permanently alter one family’s bonds. Additional works in progress include: The Robo-Bio-Doll (full-length horror) and Ten Seconds to Go (timed one-act). Yasna lives on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations.
Medha Gautham – Preethiya Saanvi
Medha Gautham (she/her) is a practicing actor, writer, and director based between Canada and the US. She fell in love with theatre at a young age as a sanctuary for transformation and play. Throughout her time in university, she continued to explore acting and directing across film and theatre. More recently, she’s embarked on her journey with writing, developing her practice with the Arts Club Theatre Company’s LEAP Program. She finds joy in deepening her understanding of her craft through observation, conversations, and embodiment. She’s passionate about bringing diverse queer South Asian voices to the forefront of media, and she’s excited to tell stories from her community. Outside of work, she loves to read (especially spec-fic!), practice archery (mission #1 – become Legolas), and name animals around her (especially birds) while thinking about what their stories might be.
