AJA HOUSTON

Aja is a nomadic writer, actor, and educator from Everywhere, USA, due to her army-brat adjacent childhood.   She writes for theatre, television, and film, drawing on passion, politics, and magical realism to build off-kilter, uncanny worlds that tell nuanced, monolith-breaking Black stories centered on women. 

 

Starting her career as an actress in London, Aja relocated to Los Angeles to focus on writing the imaginative stories free of stereotypes that she longed to act in. Aja received her MFA in Dramatic Writing from the University of Southern California. Her thesis play, Journey to Alice, was a semi-finalist in the O'Neill Theatre Conference. 

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Her other plays have been workshopped at theatres such as The Road Theatre Company, Inkwell Theatre, and the Ammunition Theatre Company, where she is also a member. 

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Currently, she is developing a play with music (not a musical) in IAMA's Emerging Playwright Group. Read her complete play library on New Play Exchange (NPX)

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In a full-circle moment, Aja recently returned to acting after retirement to star in the award-winning short film "Missing Rhythms," which she wrote. The film has garnered many accolades, notably winning The Micheaux Film Festival's "Best Thriller/Horror Short Film Award" and receiving a nomination for the Oscar-qualifying HollyShorts Festival.