Kareem has directed and developed plays at theatres including MCC, The Atlantic, The New Group, Ensemble Studio Theatre, New Dramatists, The Civilians, Writers Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Geva Theatre, Pioneer Theatre, The Magic, Contemporary American Theatre Festival, Berkeley Rep, and more. He is a New York Theatre Workshop Usual Suspect.
His plays, which include Fountains of Youth, Dodi & Diana, American Fast, A Distinct Society, The Triumphant, Pareidolia, The In-Between, and an adaptation of the novel The Yacoubian Building, have been produced at Colt Coeur, TheatreWorks Silicon Valley, Pioneer Theatre, Writers Theatre, City Theatre, Artists Repertory Theatre, InterAct Theatre, Capital Stage, Constellation Stage, Noor Theatre, Target Margin Theatre, the Human Race Theatre Company, and Theater Alliance.
Kareem has received fellowships from MacDowell, Yaddo, Sundance Theatre Lab, the Stratford Festival of Canada, New Harmony Project, Hermitage Artists Retreat, Banff Playwrights Lab, Oregon Shakespeare Festival (Phil Killian Directing Fellow), The Old Globe (Classical Directing Fellow), Eugene O’Neill Theatre Center (National Directors Fellow), Second Stage (Van Lier Directing Fellow), Soho Rep (Writer/Director Lab), Lincoln Center (Directors Lab), The New Museum (Artist-in-Residence), and New York Theater Workshop (Emerging Artist Fellow). He is a NYSCA/NYFA Playwriting Fellow.
He's been a finalist for the Princess Grace award, the O'Neill National Playwrights Conference, the National Showcase of New Plays, is a two-time winner of the Capital Rep New Play Award, and received the Joanne Woodward/Paul Newman Playwriting Award for American Fast. His work has been developed at Atlantic Theater Company, Denver Center, Northlight Theatre, New York Stage & Film, Citadel Theatre, and more.
As a screenwriter, he was in the inaugural cohort of Warner Media's Access Writers Program. His TV pilots have been finalists for the episodic labs at Sundance, Orchard Project, and Austin Film Festival.
MFA, Theatre Directing from Columbia University.
Kareem lives in New York City with his husband, acclaimed fiction writer John McManus, and their dog Kip.
playwright portrait on the set of Dodi & Diana by Peter Bellamy
Photo by Jonathan Pozniak