By Constance Jaquay Strickland

Conversations with some of #HFF26’s compelling “Women on the Fringe”

Ten years ago, I conducted my first Fringe Femme interview out of a desperate need to hear and uplift the various works and voices of women of color during the Hollywood Fringe Festival. I selfishly wanted to bear witness and, in some small way, archive the multiplicity of beautiful voices and conversations women of color were exploring.

The reality was, I was having a hard time discovering and seeing the work of women of color. I knew I had a small network, no connections, and yet I still found a way. Who else was out there existing as outliers? The hardest part of manifesting a new work is finding a way to let people know that you have a show.

The 2026 Hollywood Fringe Femme Interview series is an ode to the women who find a way to tell their stories even when the odds are against them. Each year, a group of women dares to create work by any means necessary.

It is a pleasure to introduce Fringe Femme Mozhdeh Rahmanzaei. In a time when producing plays comes based on the season, Mozhdeh’s Freedom in Limbo is a stark reminder that writing plays comes at a high cost for many artists…

That oftentimes theatre is not existing on a schedule but kept alive in the darkest of spaces, where light peaks through the hope and whispers of storytellers finding a way to tell the truth no matter the cost. That exile can be forced upon an individual, a choice to flee in order to survive or combat the practice being stifled, suffocated or swallowed whole. No matter the why, exile separates, is traumatic physically and mentally. Yet for artists it also expands the how, and we find new ways to tell stories—innovation a natural response to a new environment. Have no confusion, though: exile is a collective issue and affects us all. 

I sit in the quiet of stillness in my little studio and speak aloud the names of artists, truthtellers on whose shoulders Mozhdeh stands: Wole Soyinka, Shirin Neshat, Elizabeth Catlett, Wilfredo Lam, Mona Hatoum, Isabel Allende, Emma Goldman, Assata Shakur, Dante Alighieri… this short list is long and continues growing and growing.

May Mozhdeh continue to be a link, a resource, a place of refuge while carrying and being the memory of home.

Constance Jaquay Strickland: How long have you been sitting with this work?

Mozhdeh Rahmanzaei: It has been quite a long process; this work started about 2 years ago, a few months before my graduation. It eventually became my thesis. Over time, I kept adding new material to the play, and it gradually grew from a 20-minute piece into a one-hour performance.

Constance: What led you to the Hollywood Fringe? Why now?

Mozhdeh: When I decided to create this solo show, my intention was always to take it as far as possible and perform it in different cities. It started in Seattle, then moved to Portland and now Los Angeles. I wanted to understand different audiences and how they respond, and to keep building a dialogue through each place.

A key part of my motivation is to bring attention to the lived experience of artists in Iran. Many people, especially in the U.S., may have a general awareness that art in Iran exists under censorship and repression, but fewer people know the details of what that actually looks like on a daily, human level. As an artist, I feel a responsibility to bring those realities onto the stage.

I chose the Hollywood Fringe Festival because I believe stories from the Middle East are important here, and I want to introduce the Fringe audience to something that might feel different from what they usually see, something more personal, urgent and grounded in lived experience.

Constance: Now, you’ve given the work away and it’s out there. How does that feel?

Mozhdeh: It feels both freeing and vulnerable. I’ve given a very personal piece of myself to the world, and now it no longer fully belongs to me. But at the same time, that’s exactly what I wanted, to let it live outside of me and connect with people.

Constance: What’s been your biggest challenge in terms of the Fringe and your development process?

Mozhdeh: My biggest challenge has been wearing so many hats at the same time—I’ve been the producer, actor, writer, costume designer and in many ways even the stage manager. Holding all of those roles simultaneously has been intense, but also deeply educational. Financially, it has also been challenging as someone who has recently graduated, but I’ve come to actually appreciate challenges. I believe they build resilience, and I feel like I’ve grown a lot stronger through this process.

Another challenge has been the distance in my collaboration with my director. We’ve been rehearsing over Zoom because he is in a different city while I’m based in Seattle, which has required a different kind of focus and discipline in the development process.

Constance: Can you speak a bit about the Underground Theatres of Iran? Is this where plays of banished playwrights still live? Where new stories are being told and archived with the body instead of the pen?

Mozhdeh: Underground theatre in Iran is similar to underground music. It is a space where artists spend years trying to obtain official permission to perform, and when they are unable to get approval, many eventually give up. In Iran, performances must be approved by the department of performing art in order to be staged. Without that permission, it is not possible to officially present a play. Some of my friends in Iran no longer even apply for permits to perform. One of them told me that they now stage their plays in their home garage and invite people there. It is a bit heartbreaking, but it is the reality.

Constance: Silence. To stay silent, you say, is the cost of no home. Eternally, I feel I understand that. Yet can you give insight into what that means or represents to you, Mozhdeh?

Mozhdeh: For me, silence is never just the absence of words—it is a condition of survival. It is what people are forced into when speaking becomes too dangerous, too costly, or simply unheard. In that sense, silence becomes both protection and imprisonment at the same time.
When I say that silence is the cost of having no home, I mean that in exile or displacement, you often learn that speaking freely can make you even more vulnerable, while silence allows you to endure. But endurance is not the same as freedom.

So silence represents a tension: it is the space where you stay alive, but also where parts of your truth remain unspoken. The work is my attempt to break that silence—not by erasing it, but by making it visible and shared.

Constance: In your play, you also speak Farsi.  I love that audiences have the chance to hear an ancient language onstage right in Hollywood. Is it difficult to write a multilingual play?

Mozhdeh: Yes, it wasn’t that difficult. Maybe it was challenging at first, but it became easier over time. In fact, I enjoy performing some of the lines in English. Acting in two languages has also helped me as an actor—it has made me more aware of how each language affects my body and presence on stage, and how switching between them changes the way I perform.

Constance: Also, what clues or revelations have you discovered about what it means to be seen or go unseen?

Mozhdeh: What I discovered is that being seen is not only about visibility on stage, but about being truly understood in your complexity as a human being. In this process, I realized that we are often most seen when there is genuine listening, presence and openness from others. At the same time, being unseen is not always about physical absence—it can happen even in a crowd, when your inner world, your history or your truth is not acknowledged. This work taught me that theatre has the power to shift that experience, even briefly, by creating a space where someone’s silence, voice and presence can finally be witnessed.

Constance: What joy did you discover when creating your show?

Mozhdeh: Culture and art can act like a bridge between two different worlds and ways of thinking. One of the greatest joys I discovered while creating this show was learning how to build something together through two different languages and perspectives. My director and I come from different cultures and artistic approaches, and I realized how exciting and inspiring that difference can be. It became a space of exchange, discovery, and creative energy.

Constance: Did you face any obstacles?

Mozhdeh: One of the biggest obstacles for me in creating this play, and especially in performing it, was that I had to act out moments on stage that I had personally experienced years ago and that were part of my own life. But I did it because, in my view, the stage is a place where we must be honest and tell the truth about reality.

Constance: So what has it cost you (and ‘cost’ goes beyond money) to bring Freedom in Limbo to the Hollywood Fringe?

Mozhdeh: Bringing Freedom in Limbo to the Hollywood Fringe has cost me far more than money. It required months of work, emotional vulnerability, and the courage to revisit painful memories of exile and displacement. As an immigrant artist far from my family and homeland, every step of this process has demanded persistence, sacrifice, and faith in the importance of telling this story. Yet despite the cost, I believe these stories deserve to be heard.

Constance: After the lights and the audience disappear, what do you hope one remembers or takes away after seeing your show?

Mozhdeh: After the lights go out and the audience leaves, I hope they carry with them a sense of shared humanity. I want them to remember that behind every story of displacement or silence, there is a person who continues to dream, to question, and to survive. If anything remains, I hope it is a feeling—that even in moments of loss and uncertainty, connection is still possible, and voices that have been silenced still find a way to be heard.

Never give up. I kept going until it finally happened.

Constance: Is your play a love letter or a plea to Iran? Do you believe theatre is a bridge to healing and rebuilding?

Mozhdeh: I believe theatre can be a form of healing—I truly believe in it. And this is not a shout toward Iran, but a shout for Iran—perhaps one day, our voices and our demand for freedom will be heard.

Constance: Can one ever return home after exile?

Mozhdeh: Definitely no.

Constance: What is lost from exile? Not only for the individual or their family, but for Iran?

Mozhdeh: This work was shaped by both personal experience and witnessing the experiences of others. As an artist forced to leave my homeland, I have lived with displacement, uncertainty and the feeling of being caught between two worlds. At the same time, I have witnessed the struggles of countless Iranians—artists, activists and ordinary people—whose voices have been silenced or suppressed. This piece grew out of both my own journey and the stories I carry with me from those who could not speak freely for themselves.

Constance: As an African-American woman whose ancestors were stolen from their home and tongue, I often think about the idea of home, memory, displacement and what is left from that rupture. What have you learned about displacement and what ‘Home’ means?

Mozhdeh: To me, this separation carried a deeper meaning. It taught me that a country, a homeland, a land—at its core—means family. That is what I came to understand. Home means family, something I had never truly understood before. If I were to describe it, I would say that home is the place where you can walk freely and without fear, without constantly worrying that you might fall.

Constance: Can anywhere else ever replace ‘Home’?

Mozhdeh: No. A new place can offer safety, opportunities, and even happiness, but it can never fully replace home. Home is more than a place, it is the people, memories, and sense of belonging that stay with us wherever we go.

For info on Freedom in Limbo at the Hollywood Fringe visit https://www.hollywoodfringe.org/projects/12444

Go Here for More About Mozhdeh Rahmanzaei