Artist Bio

(Bio as of August 2016)

Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig returns to Goodman Theatre, where her play The World of Extreme Happiness appeared in the 2012 New Stages Festival and the 2014/2015 Season. The play was also produced at the National Theatre in London and Manhattan Theatre Club. Her other plays have been produced by Trafalgar Studios 2 (West End), Crowded Fire Theater, Page 73 Productions, InterACT Theatre, Borderlands Theater and the Contemporary American Theater Festival. She received the Wasserstein Prize, the Yale Drama Series Award, an Edinburgh Fringe First Award and the Keene Prize for Literature. She is currently under commission to create works for the Royal Shakespeare Company, Goodman Theatre and the National Theatre. She received an MFA in writing from the James A. Michener Center for Writers at University of Texas at Austin, a BA in sociology from Brown University and a certificate in ensemble-based physical theater from the Dell’Arte International School of Physical Theatre. Her work has been published by Yale University Press, Glimmer Train, Methuen Drama, Samuel French and Dramatists Play Service. She was born in Philadelphia and raised in Northern Virginia, Okinawa, Taipei and Beijing. She directs the undergraduate playwriting concentration at University of California, Santa Barbara, where she is an assistant professor of drama.