Tasnim Hossain is a director, playwright, dramaturg and screenwriter. She is the current Resident Director at Melbourne Theatre Company.
In 2024, Tasnim directed the Australian premiere of English, the Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Sanaz Toossi for Melbourne Theatre Company, which transferred to Canberra Theatre Centre after an extended season.
Earlier in the year, she was assistant director on Seventeen for the Company. She was also co-director and dramaturg on former foreign correspondent, Jane Hutcheon’s Lost in Shanghai (CAAP/Arts on Tour), which toured nationally after previous seasons in Sydney and Adelaide.
In 2023, she directed the Australian premiere of I Wanna Be Yours for Melbourne Theatre Company’s Education program, which toured around regional Victoria. She was assistant director on new Australian musical, Bloom, and on Bernhardt/Hamlet for Melbourne Theatre Company. Her play, The Village, directed by Bali Padda, also premiered at Q Theatre at the Joan Sutherland Performing Arts Centre.
Tasnim won the 2022 Sydney Theatre Award for Best Direction of an Independent Production for her sold-out production of Yellow Face (Dinosaurus Productions/KXT) and was shortlisted for the 2022 Griffin Award for her script Bombay Takeaway. She also directed Sweat (VCA), How I Learned to Drive (NIDA) and co-adapted and dramaturged Burn Witch Burn (fervour.).
In 2021, she directed -.- for Eat Me (NIDA), Rough Draft #49 – Garage Sale (STC), and the 2021 Griffin Award readings. In 2019, she was assistant director on Banging Denmark (STC) and on The House at Boundary Road, Liverpool (Bontom).
Tasnim is a co-recipient of the Create NSW-Hayes Theatre NSW Musical Theatre Fellowship with Vidya Makan, through which she is currently writing the book for a new musical. She collaborated with the composer, Corrina Bonshek, on a new Australian art song for Blush Opera’s 12 THREADS project. She also collaborated with Corrina and mezzo-soprano, Jenny Duck-Chong, on an art song performed at the Chinese Garden of Friendship in Darling Harbour.
Tasnim has toured solo works, Boys Light Up, Letters to John and Zak and Reefa’s Bollywood Funeral, to festivals around Australia, including Griffin Theatre’s Batch Festival in Sydney, Fringe World in Perth, You Are Here in Canberra, and Crack Theatre Festival in Newcastle.
She wrote the monologues This Is The Place for Critical Stages/Paines Plough’s Come to Where I Am series, Delivery for Playwriting Australia’s Dear Australia project and Hope and Wisdom for ABC Radio National Fictions. She has written work for young people through the Australian Theatre for Young People (ATYP), Canberra Youth Theatre and Shopfront.
Tasnim was a creator, writer, and actor for Carpark Clubbing (ABC iView), which won Best in Writing at Stareable Fest and Best Ensemble at Die Seriale.
She has participated in programs such as Co-Curious’ “On the Bright Side”, supported by Netflix, as well as the inaugural NSW/ACT AFTRS Talent Camp. She has worked as a story developer with Screen Canberra on both their FilmPOD and TVPOD programs. She has also contributed as a writer to ABC Everyday, SBS Voices and ArtsHub.
Tasnim has been an Artistic Associate at the National Institute of Dramatic Art, Sydney Theatre Company – Contemporary Asian Australian Performance (CAAP) Directors’ Initiative participant, Griffin Theatre Company’s Studio Artist, Melbourne Theatre Company’s Women in Theatre mentee, and ATYP Resident Playwright.
She received the Women’s Agenda 2022 Emerging Leader in Arts and Entertainment Award. She was a Theatre Network Australia’s Leadershift program participant, as well as a Creative Australia Future Leader, and Australian Progress Fellowship alumna. She served on the board of ATYP from 2018 to 2023.