Adam Odsess-Rubin (He/Him) is the Founding Artistic Director of National Queer Theater (NQT) and the acclaimed Criminal Queerness Festival, showcasing censored and criminalized LGBTQ+ artists from around the world. Odsess-Rubin has directed community-based theater programs such as Write it Out! for playwrights living with HIV, New Visions Fellowship for Black trans artists, DREAMing Out Loud for LGBTQ undocumented writers, and Youth Write Now for young queer playwrights. Since 2021, he has been a lead Teaching Artist for Rainbow Connection, an intergenerational theater program for queer teens and elders in Fire Island. In 2023, he launched Staging Pride: Queer Youth Theater, a free afterschool theater program for marginalized LGBTQ+ youth in New York City at The Center. At NQT, Odsess-Rubin has presented work with Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, New York Theatre Workshop, NYC Pride, HERE Arts Center, MCC Theater, and PAC NYC. Through NQT, he has raised over one million dollars for queer and trans artists since 2018, and has received praise for his work in The Advocate, The New York Times, American Theater Magazine, Playbill, and Time Out New York. Odsess-Rubin is a Teaching Artist and former Education Associate at New York Theatre Workshop, and served as the first Education and Community Programs Fellow at American Conservatory Theatre. Odsess-Rubin has published work in Howlround, Yale's Theater Magazine and The Teaching Artist Journal, and is a 2020 Mayor's Grant for Cultural Impact awardee and AM NY LGBTQ+ Power Player. BA: UC Santa Cruz MA: New York University.