Described by the New York Times as “wonderfully real and raw,” Liba Vaynberg is a first generation American playwright, screenwriter, and actor. The daughter of Ukrainian and Azeri Jewish refugees, she is bilingual in English and Russian. She studied Molecular Biology at Yale before receiving her MFA at Columbia.

Plays include The Matriarchs which was selected for and developed at the Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference and developed with the Civilians R&D group. It was also a Princess Grace Finalist, Blackburn Nominee, Theater J Abramson Finalist (Top 3), Blue Ink Award Finalist, Jewish Plays Project and Premiere-Stages Semi-Finalist. Her play, The Gett, was the inaugural commission at Rattlestick with CBE, a Princess Grace Semi-Finalist, Colorado New Play Festival Selection, and reprised as part of Theater Ariel’s Salon Series. Round Table premiered at 59E59 (Times Square Chronicles’ 10 Best Plays of 2019, Gary Marshall Theater New Works Semi-Finalist 2018) and was reprised at Tierra Del Sol. She wrote the The Elephants In The Room with the IAMA Emerging Playwrights Lab and wrote for Star City (Sony/AppleTV+), a Cold War thriller that follows an alternative history of the space race.

Other plays include Scheiss Book which she both wrote and performed at the United Solo Festival at Theatre Row, winning Best One-Woman Show as well as the Backstage Magazine Audience Choice Award. The show was reprised at the wild project, Dixon Place, Stonewall Inn and the Kitchen Theater. Her collaboration with Dina Vovsi—The Blue Parts—was commissioned by the Working Theater via the 5 Boroughs 1 City Initiative and was the recipient of a NYSCA grant and a Drama League Special Residency. Her play with Emily Louise Perkins, The Russian & The Jew was the recipient of a COJECO BluePrint Fellowship and produced by the Tank. She was a Colt Coeur Artist In Residence and is now a Company Member.

She writes for Lilith Magazine and was the recipient of a Water E. Dakin Fellowship at the Sewanee Writers’ Conference and the LABA Humor Fellowship. As a performer, highlights include 4 seasons of New Amsterdam (NBC), Annie Blumberg in the PBS broadcast of The Soap Myth opposite Ed Asner & Tova Feldshuh, originating the role of Now Jane in Bekah Brunstetter’s Oregon Trail at the WP, Lost In Yonkers opposite Marsha Mason (for which she received a CT Critic’s Circle nomination), Harley Elias’ Bad Dog at Miami New Drama, and The Golem of Havana at La Mama.