Meet our Team
SIVAN BATTAT
DIRECTOR OF NEW WORK DEVELOPMENT
Sivan Battat (she/they) is an Iraqi-American theatre director & community organizer. Sivan’s work is across genres - in the theatre, in community, in ritual celebration, and beyond.
Recent directing credits: Layalina, Martin Yousif Zebari (National Queer Theater); The Night Traveller, Salah Abdul Saboor (Cutting Ball Theater); Close to Home, Sharifa Yasmin (Uprising Theatre Company); Coexistence My Ass, Noam Shuster (Harvard University/Tour); Who the Fuck is Ahmed, Michael Zalta (Rough Draft Fest, LPAC); She He Me, Raphael Khouri (National Queer Theater); Baba Karam, Sanaz Toossi, McArabia, Sevan Kaloustian Greene (Atlantic Middle Eastern Mixfest); Pie Shop Play, Alice Pencavel (Corkscrew Festival); East o’, West o’!, Michelle J. Rodriguez (ANTFest, Ars Nova). Sivan is currently the Roundabout Theatre Company Directing Fellow, the Drama League Leo Shull Musical Directing Fellow at New York Stage & Film, and a member of TCG's Rising Leaders of Color Cohort. Other residencies include: NYTW (Adelphi Residency), National Queer Theater (Mount Tremper Arts Residency), Roundabout Directors’ Group, 14th Street Y (LABA Fellowship), Studio Theatre (Artistic Apprentice). Sivan has assisted and associate directed extensively regionally & off-Broadway, with directors including Whitney White, Sam Gold, Rebecca Taichman, Neil Pepe, GT Upchurch, David Muse and more.
As an organizer, Sivan has worked with NYC-based Jews for Racial and Economic Justice (JFREJ) in numerous capacities, specifically organizing with Mizrahi & Sephardi Jews. She recently creative directed the first ever Mimouna, a celebration of identity & ritual led by members of the Mizrahi/Sephardi Caucus in partnership with the Arab American Association of NY. Sivan has curated several iterations of Salon Al-Mahjar صالون المهجر, a performance salon for queer & trans MENASA artists, leads ancestral storytelling workshops, and serves on the board with Ammud: the Jews of Color Torah Academy. Sivan has also worked at the Arab Hebrew Theatre of Jaffa, and with organizations Breaking the Silence, the Center for Jewish Nonviolence, Jewish Voice for Peace and with various Jewish communities to unlearn Zionism and organize for Palestinian justice & liberation. Sivan seeks to bridge justice work and cultural work, bringing the power of performance to our movements, and the vision of movement work to our theaters. BA Wesleyan University. Website: sivanbattat.com
Kate Moore Heaney
ARTISTIC PRODUCER
Kate Moore Heaney (she/her) is a NYC-based theatre director, producer, and dramaturg of Lebanese & Irish descent. She is committed to promoting empathy and investigating social, political, and human rights issues through theatre. In addition to serving as Artistic Producer of Noor Theatre, Kate is also a steering committee member for the newly formed Middle Eastern and North African Theater Makers Alliance (MENATMA) and a member of the literary team at Long Wharf Theatre. She has also directed and/or developed new work with The Civilians’ R&D Group, New York Theatre Workshop, The Amoralists, The Flea, The Shakespeare Society, The 24 Hour Plays: Nationals, and other NYC companies. She has assistant or associate directed with Ibex Theatricals/The New Vic, McCarter Theatre, Clubbed Thumb, Yale Institute for Music Theatre, and The 24 Hour Plays on Broadway. B.A.: Yale. katemooreheaney.com.
ARIANA SARFARAZI
eXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Ariana (she/her) is a transactional entertainment attorney who has been named “One to Watch” by Best Lawyers in America A highly versatile attorney with a diverse skill set, Ariana handles a wide range of entertainment transactions in the theater, film/television, music, and publishing industries. As a theatrical attorney, she represents producers and investors in the development, production, and financing of live stage productions; counsels not-for-profit theater companies and related theatrical organizations; and advises a wide range of creative talent including Tony Award-winning bookwriters, composers, lyricists, directors, choreographers, and actors. Once a proud “theatre kid” herself, Ariana is passionate about marrying her legal education with her deep-rooted love of the arts and social justice to support an evolving industry. Ariana serves on the board of Broadway for Arts Education, is a member of Theatre Producers of Color (TPOC), and is proud to serve as a volunteer pro bono attorney with Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts. She is a graduate of U.C. Berkeley, where she double majored in International Development and Middle Eastern Studies, and The George Washington University Law School.
Salma s. zohdi
dIRECTOR OF DEVELOPMENT AND COMMUNICATIONS
Salma S. Zohdi (she/her) is an Egyptian Dramaturg and theatre practitioner based in New York City. She is a cross-cultural storyteller who strives to align theatre making with social justice movement building. Salma is passionate about facilitating and using the power of storytelling to amplify and uplift a wide range of voices as well as to challenge injustice.
In Egypt, Salma was Alumni Community Theatre’s (ACT, Egypt) Public Relations & Marketing Manager, where she also worked as a producer, teaching artist, stage manager, and assistant director. She was also amongst millions that took to the streets in 2011 as part of Jan 25 Revolution. Ever since, she actively sought to meld the principles of social justice movement building to her theatre practice. This led her to New York City in 2013, where she studied and have since been practicing dramaturgy, communications, creative producing, theatre administration, literary advising, and new play development. Salma’s credits include The Mecca Tales, Operating Systems, The Conversationalists, Pilgrims Musa & Sheri in the New World, Global Forms Theatre Festival (GFTF), Once Upon A Time Called Now, Drowning in Cairo, and House of Joy.
Salma strives to work closely with teams that run on transparent and socially conscious values and is devoted to collaborating on initiatives and projects that spark dialogue around narratives that are repeatedly overlooked by the mainstream theatrical and media scene.
MA: AUC - English & Comparative Literature. MFA: Columbia University - Theatre (Dramaturgy). Website: zohdiscriptconsultancy.com
To connect with Noor’s staff, please see Details below:
For artistic inquiries, please reach out to Kate at kate@noortheatre.org and Sivan at sivan@noortheatre.org.
For casting opportunities and postings, please write to opportunities@noortheatre.org.
For partnerships and/or cross-promotions, please write to Salma at salma@noortheatre.org.
For all other inquiries, please write to info@noortheatre.org
CATHERINE CORAY
AFFILIATE PRODUCING DIRECTOR
Catherine Coray (she/her) has been on the faculty of NYU Tisch School of the Arts since 1991, and teaches and collaborates with artists in Austria, Belarus, Chile, Cuba, Egypt and Lebanon. Previously, she was the director of hotINK at The Lark, which introduced New York audiences to new plays from over 50 countries; she now is the Program Director for The Lark Middle East-US Playwright Exchange. In 2014, she curated In The Same Room, a conference of Middle-Eastern Women in Theater at the NYU Abu Dhabi Institute in NYC. She also convened the 2016 Middle East America gathering at The Lark, and in November 2016 curated and co-produced a festival at the NYU Abu Dhabi Arts Center in November 2016 called Arab Voices: here/there/then/now. In March 2018 she curated and co-produced Arab Voices: Stories of Palestine, which brought together three Arab-American playwrights with Lebanese and Palestinian actors to introduce their work to Beirut audiences at Dar el Nimer Center for Palestinian Art and Culture. Catherine is a member of The Lark Artistic Cabinet and serves on the advisory boards of The Mercurian translation journal, The Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics, the American Friends of the Ludwig Foundation for Cuban Art (AFLFC), Arab Stages and the Lebanese American University Communication Arts division.
Board of Directors
President: Nilou Safinya, Entertainment Producer
Treasurer: ariana Sarfarazi
Secretary: ariana Sarfarazi
Hussein Khalifa, MVision, Founding Partner; Board Member
Laith Nakli, Actor/Playwright, Board Member
Heather Raffo, Actor/Playwright, Board Member
artistic advisory board
Amer Bisat, Managing Director, Blackrock
Beth Blickers, Literary Agent, APA
Kathleen Chalfant, Actor (Angels in America, Wit)
Maha Chehlaoui, Founder, Noor Theatre
Cherien Dabis, Filmmaker (Amreeka)
Oskar Eustis, Artistic Director, The Public Theater
Mara Isaacs, Founding Producer at Octopus Theatricals
Arian Moayed, Actor (Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo), Artistic Director of Waterwell
Scott Morfee, Producer at The Barrow Street Theater
Dean Obeidallah, Comedian and Producer (Amman Comedy Festival, Axis of Evil, NYAACF)
Susan Peters, Executive Director, Arab Bankers Association of North America
Lisa Peterson, Director and Playwright (An Iliad)
Jose Rivera, Playwright and Screenwriter (Motorcycle Diaries, Marisol, Cloud Tectonics)
Tony Shalhoub, Actor (Monk, Golden Boy)
Naomi Wallace, Playwright (One Flea Spare, The Fever Chart)