SEEMA SUEKO grew up in Honolulu with a Pakistani father and a third generation Kona-Japanese-American mother. She received her Master’s Degree in International Relations from the University of Chicago.

 

Between 2004 and 2020, Seema served successively as Co-Founder and Executive Artistic Director of Mo`olelo Performing Arts Company in San Diego, Associate Artistic Director of The Pasadena Playhouse in Pasadena, California, and Deputy Artistic Director of Arena Stage in Washington, D.C.

 

She received the TCG Alan Schneider Director Award in 2022 and balances work as a freelance artist and consultant with caregiving for her parents in Hawai'i. She is a Co-Curator with DNAWORKS and is adapting the novel Song of the Exile by Hawaiian writer Kiana Davenport into a play with jazz music.

 

For American Theatre magazine, Seema recently wrote Solidarity, in This Economy?; Searching Opportunities; and Lost to Fun.

 

She is featured in this Howlround Theatre Commons essay, "Everybody Arts," or How We're Scaling Arts Practive to Community. 

 

Other recognition and awards include: Chicago Jeff Awards, NAACP San Diego Lorraine Hansberry Award, American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee Artistic and Cultural Achievement Award, Asian Pacific American Friends of the Theater Artist of the Year, San Diego Craig Noel Awards, and the California State Assembly Shirley N. Weber Award.

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