Banna Desta

Banna Desta is an Eritrean and Ethiopian-American writer for the stage and screen who crafts stories about and for people of African descent. She is the author of The Abyssinians (Audible); Midnight in Abyssinia (La MaMa’s CultureHub); Red Taxi and Pining which premiered at Rattlestick Theater and was published in Samuel French in 2019. Her work for the stage has been supported and workshopped by Atlantic Theater Company, The Apollo Theater, National Black Theatre, La Jolla Playhouse, The New Group and the Dramatists Guild Foundation. She has held residencies at SPACE on Ryder Farm, Art Omi, Marble House Project and Tofte Lake Center. She was a staff writer for the BET+ series First Wives Club (Netflix Top Ten) and has assisted multiple television series in both the writers room and on set, for networks like NBC, Amazon and Apple TV. She is a writing professor and arts educator at NYU, Rehabilitation through the Arts and Harlem Children’s Zone. Banna is represented by United Talent Agency and Kaplan/Perrone.