Photography: Lauren Desberg

Named a “Woman to Watch” by the Broadway Women’s Fund, Melis Aker is a writer, actor, and musician from Turkey based between London and New York. She has a series in development with Skybound Entertainment and will next be developing the musical play Hundred Feet Tall with Benjamin Scheuer, Jemima Williams and Samuel Wyer directed by Katy Rudd at the Old Vic, and her play Fish at the Signature Theatre Company directed by Tatiana Pandiani. She is currently in post-production for her film Baba in Graceland.

Melis is a recipient of the Sundance Interdisciplinary Program grant, the New York Community Trust/Van Lier Fellowship, and is the Signature Theatre Company’s LaunchPad resident playwright and amongst Theatre503’s 503Five, where she is under commission.

She has had writing commissioned by and developed at Atlantic Theatre Company (Middle East Mixfest), Ars Nova (Play Group member), New York Theatre Workshop (2050 fellow), Dramatists Guild (DGF fellow), The Eugene O’Neill Theatre Center, National Alliance for Musical Theatre, Goodspeed Writers Grove, New Group, Roundabout Theatre Company’s Space Jam, LaMaMa, the Lark, Noor, 24 Hour Plays, Magic Theatre in the U.S., as well as the Finborough and Park theatres in the U.K.

Melis’ screenplay “ARI” (“Bee”) was at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival as part of Maison des Scenaristes, and her TV screenplays have been selected for the Orchard Project’s Episodic Lab, and IFP week. She has also worked on the development of a screenplay with Revelations Entertainment headed by Morgan Freeman.

Her plays include: Fish; Indigo Dreams; Field, Awakening (2019 Kilroy’s List, Columbia@Roundabout finalist, Sundance finalist, Berkeley Rep Ground Floor semifinalist, Playwrights Realm finalist); Dragonflies (Sundance finalist); Scraps and Things (Playing on Air, starring Carol Kane, directed by Neil Pepe, featured on the New York Times); AZUL (O’Neill NMTC, NAMT, recipient of NYC Women’s Fund); Mother and the Beast (previously called: When My Mama Was a Hittite) (Columbia@Roundabout finalist); Fractio Panis (Homebound Project/No Kid Hungry, starring Brian Cox and Nicole Ansari, directed by Tatiana Pandiani); Hound Dog; Manar (Columbia@Roundabout finalist, Theatre503 Playwriting Award semifinalist); 330 Pegasus: A Love Letter (Jerome NY Fellowship finalist); OPET Diaries (Page73 semifinalist); and Gilded Isle.

Acting and music credits include “The Equalizer” (CBS, starring Queen Latifah), "The Blacklist: Redemption" (NBC), “Seneca” (HBO Max), Love in Afghanistan (Arena Stage & Roundabout Theatre Company), We Live in Cairo (New World Stages), Proof (Edinburgh Fringe). As a singer-songwriter, Melis has released a quartet of seasonal session EPs with acoustic versions of songs. Her song “The Unknowing” was in the final reel of the 2017 NPR Tiny Desk contest.

Melis has worked as Ayad Akhtar’s assistant, and given a StoryCorps and TEDx talk. She has taught at NYU, The New School, and is working on her debut novel through her PhD at King's College London, where she also teaches. She holds an MFA from Columbia University, a Certificate for Acting from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and a BA from Tufts University.

Melis is represented by CAA.