Jaclyn Backhaus

Jaclyn Backhaus is a playwright, screenwriter, & educator hailing from Phoenix, Arizona. Her Off-Broadway plays include OUT OF TIME (NAATCO and The Public Theater, dir. Les Waters), WIVES (Playwrights Horizons, dir. Margot Bordelon), INDIA PALE ALE (Winner, 2018 Horton Foote Prize, MTC, dir. Will Davis), MEN ON BOATS (Clubbed Thumb, Playwrights Horizons, dir. Will Davis), FOLK WANDERING (dir. Andrew Neisler, Pipeline), and YOU ON THE MOORS NOW (TRE, dir. John Kurzynowski). Other plays include DANA DURING TECH WEEK, ORACLE/BOB'S BACCHAE, and END-OF-LIFE. Her work for TV/film includes AS FAR AS THE EYE CAN SEE (selection, Sundance Episodic Intensive 2025), DOULAS, a half-hour comedy, and PREETI POPPED IT (selection, 1497 Features Lab). She is one the core members of The Kilroys, a professor of playwriting at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, a creative director at Fresh Ground Pepper NYC, and editor of weekly theater zine @oootheater. She was the 2016 Tow Foundation Playwright-in-Residence at Clubbed Thumb and is currently a New Dramatists resident playwright.