Josh Azouz was born in 1985 and is a London-based Jewish writer and director for theatre, film, and television. He has been invited onto writers groups at the Royal Court and the Bush Theatre and is an associate artist for The Yard and MUJU (Muslim-Jewish Theatre Company). For MUJU, he devised and directed the comedy sketch show Come In. Sit Down! (Tricycle Theatre, co-directed with Muslim Salman Siddiqui) in 2015. On this project, he has said: “I’m in my 20s, I live in London, and I don’t have a Muslim friend. The problem is that if you don’t know people from other communities, you make assumptions.” (Jewish News).

Both of his full-length plays, The Mikvah Project and Buggy Baby, played for extended sold out runs at The Yard Theatre in East London’s Hackney Wick. The Mikvah Project (2015) is set around the eponymous pool for ritual cleansing and focuses on the relationship of 17-year-old Eitan and 30-something Avi.

His horror comedy Buggy Baby premiered in 2018, directed by Ned Bennett. It tells the surrealist story of a refugee family under pressure and drugs: Nur, Jaden, and Nur’s baby, Aya (played in a virtuoso performance by adult Jasmine Jones). This production won a Channel 4 playwright award.

On the strength of these successful runs, Azouz has been on attachment to the National Youth Theatre at the Soho Theatre, where his play Victoria’s Knickers ran in October and November 2018. He is currently under commission to the Bush Theatre and the Almeida Theatre.

Plays

—. Buggy Baby & The Mikvah Project: Two Plays. London: Nick Hern Books, 2018.

—. Victoria’s Knickers. London: Nick Hern Books, 2018.