2023 Fellowship Class

Simran Bal is a playwright/screenwriter originally from Columbia, Missouri. Her plays have been developed with Jackalope Theatre, Steep Theatre, and Victory Gardens. She was a finalist for Austin Film Festival’s Script Competition in 2021 with her play “Sohni Mahiwal,” and a finalist for Screencraft’s stageplay competition in 2020 with her play “Departure.” Simran’s work often explores South Asian/mixed identity, coming-of-age stories, and rural life. She is currently based in NYC. Simran is a writer’s assistant to Madhuri Shekar—pre-strike, she assisted with developing pilots for Disney+, HBO Max, and Netflix, and currently assists with play scripts. BA from Northwestern University, MFA at NYU (2023).

Born and raised in New York (but not the cool, city part) Lizz Bangura is a Sierra Leonean-American, writer/director whose projects center the beauty and temperament of everyday Black life. She specifically likes to focus on the tumultuous experiences of her fellow Zoomers through coming-of-age, dark comedies. Before landing the role as a showrunner's assistant on the upcoming Paramount project, Jodie, Lizz started her career as a writer/producer at MTV. She was also an inaugural member of SuperSpecial's TRIBE fellowship curated by Insecure's EP, Amy Aniobi.  With honesty, intimacy, compassion, and of course, humor, Lizz strives to create safe and brave spaces, so underrepresented groups, like herself, will be seen, heard, and experience the joy entitled to all human beings. Lizz currently resides in Los Angeles, where she enjoys watching bad reality television, obsessing over her cat, and taking very long naps which, yes, are still considered naps.

Sandra Jackson-Opoku is author of the American Library Association Black Caucus award-winning novel, The River Where Blood is Born, and Hot Johnny and the Women Who Loved Him, an Essence Magazine Bestseller in Hardcover Fiction. Jackson-Opoku’s work has won a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, an Esteemed Literary Artist Award from the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, the Lifeline Theatre BIPOC Adaptation Showcase, a Globe Soup Story Award, quarterfinals placement in the Stage 32 Diversity Springboard Screenwriting Contest, a Plentitudes Journal Fiction Prize, the Minotaur Books/Malice Domestic Best First Traditional Mystery Books Competition, and more.Sandra Jackson-Opoku has taught creative writing at Columbia College Chicago, the University of Chicago, the University of Miami, and Chicago State University. She presents workshops, readings, and literary presentations in schools, libraries, and arts organizations worldwide.

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At the age of twenty-five, Sara Kimura quit being a youth minister, got the hell out of her conservative evangelical church, and began her TV journey as an assistant at Jason Katims’ production company. Over the next three years, she would work on six TV shows and find her voice writing dramedies about women of color exploring their identities - cultural, ethnic, sexual, and religious. She is dedicated to writing unconventional coming-of-age stories that help people on the margins feel a little less alone. Sara recently completed the Warner Brothers Writers Workshop Class of 2023 and is currently working as the Showrunner’s Assistant on Shadow & Bone on Netflix.

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Jon Lazar is a Los Angeles-based Latino writer/director from NY. He is one of four children -- the only boy surrounded by three sisters and was a Zamboni driver before obtaining his MFA in writing from Columbia University. His work tends to focus on character-driven crime drama and mysteries with themes of mental illness and examining familial roots.

Haley is a Supervising Producer on MTV’s Ridiculousness and a comedic project consultant. Having grown up a closeted lesbian in right-wing Florida, Haley took all the fun parts of being a redneck and left the rest behind. Does she have season tickets to the Rams? Yee-haw. Has she ever missed a Women’s March? Yee-naw. Drawing on her own conflict as an outsider in the South, Haley's brash style is a contrast that is equal parts comedy and actuality; after all you can’t spell “Funny” without T-R-A-U-M-A! Her writing focuses on themes of justice and belonging.