Get Tickets

Proudly Presents

West Coast Premiere

“Mesmerizing, Stunning, Deeply Moving”

The Guardian

A play by Amir Reza Koohestani

Starring Mohammad Aghebeti and Ainaz Azarhoush

A Mehr Theatre Group Production

Presented in association with the University of California, Irvine Claire Trevor School of the Arts

Previews: Oct 18-22, 2026
Premiere Night: Oct 23, 2026
Regular Performances: Oct 24 - Nov 8, 2026

Recommendation: Age 12+

Blind Runner interweaves the destinies of three Iranians in an international multi-media hit proclaimed “mesmerizing” by The Guardian.
At the insistence of his wife, a political prisoner, a man agrees to help a blind woman train for a race in Paris. After placing third, they take on a second challenge. Can they run the 38-kilometer Channel Tunnel from France to the UK in a few hours to avoid being hit by the first train of the morning?

Performed in Persian with English supertitles.

About Amir Reza Koohestani

Amir Reza Koohestani was born in Shiraz, Iran, in 1978. At a young age, he began publishing short stories in local newspapers and working in film. After a brief experience as a performer, he devoted his time to writing his first plays—And the Day Never Came (1999) and The Murmuring Tales (2000)—for the Mehr Theatre Group.

Koohestani’s third play, Dance on Glasses (2001), gained him international notoriety and the support of several European theatrical artistic directors and festivals. Further work includes the plays Recent Experiences (from the original text by Canadian writers Nadia Ross and Jacob Wren, 2003); Amid the Clouds (2005); Dry Blood & Fresh Vegetables (2007); Quartet: A Journey North (2008); Where Were You on January 8th? (2009); Ivanov (2011); and The Fourth Wall (from the original play England by Tim Crouch, 2012), which was presented one hundred times in an art gallery in Tehran.

Over the past decade, Koohestani wrote and directed the plays Timeloss (2013), Hearing (2015), and Summerless (2018), forming the “Time Trilogy,” as presented at the Festival TNB in Rennes, France, in November 2018.

Since 2006, Koohestani has worked independently across Europe at Münchner Kammerspiele, Thalia Theater, Deutsches Theater, La Comédie de Genève, Riksteatern, and Theater Freiburg, creating more than 15 new productions. He has established strong creative partnerships with actress, playwright, and director Mahin Sadri; light designer and scenographer Éric Soyer; composer Matthias Peyker; and video artist Philip Hohenwarter.

Koohestani also regularly collaborates with actor and film director Mani Haghighi, with whom he co-wrote the scripts for the films Modest Reception (Netpac Award at the 2012 Berlin International Film Festival) and Subtraction (July 2023).

In May 2023, after a two-year pause due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Koohestani and his company created and began touring Blind Runner, which premiered in Brussels as part of the Kunstenfestivaldesarts.

His plays are distinguished by their poetic narratives, subtle criticism, and exploration of personal and political themes. Through his creations, Koohestani continues to inspire and challenge audiences around the world, combining the intimate and the universal while offering a unique perspective on the intersection of Iranian theater and contemporary global theater.

Far from limiting himself to writing and directing, Koohestani is also involved in the transmission of knowledge. He leads workshops at prestigious institutions such as La Manufacture (“On Narratives and Aesthetics in Contemporary Theater”), the CIFAS Atelier 2016 (“Building Theater from Personal Stories”), and the Berliner Festspiele International Forum, thereby promoting innovation and exchange in contemporary theater creation. These commitments reflect his dedication to nurturing creative talent and advancing the global artistic community.

In 2025, Amir led the École des Maîtres—an international traveling theatre training course—with 20 actors of five different nationalities. Together, they presented the fruits of their work through different proposals in Liège, Lisbon, Coimbra, Milan, Udine, and Angers.

About Mohammad Aghebeti

Mohammad Aghebati is an award-winning Iranian theatre director and actor. A graduate of Art University in Tehran, he received accolades early in his career that led to his productions touring Asia and Europe while he was still in his 20s. Aghebati was invited to the United States through an artist residency at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in 2009 that lead to a Special Research Fellowship at Yale University’s School of Drama. He received his MFA in Performance and Media Arts from Brooklyn College. Since, he has taught at institutions such as Tehran University and Shanghai School of Drama and has served as jury member at various festivals. Aghebati is also a known actor whose notable film projects include 2021 Grand Prix Winner at Cannes Film Festival, Hero, directed by the twice Oscar winning director, Asghar Farhadi; Modest Reception (Berlinale 2012), They (Cannes 2017), and is the lead of the Berlinale award-winning film The Great Yawn and 2025 Berlinale debut feature 1001 Frames.

Follow Mohammad Aghebati

About Ainaz Azarhoush

Ainaz Azarhoush is an Iranian actress and filmmaker. Her film credits include Fish and Cat, winner of the Horizons Special Prize at the Venice Film Festival, The Paternal House, and The Pig. On stage, she starred in Amir Reza Koohestani’s Hearing, presented internationally at Festival d’Avignon, Festival d’Automne in Paris, and Schaubühne in Berlin. She is currently touring with Koohestani’s Blind Runner, which premiered at Kunstenfestivaldesarts in Brussels, completed a three-week Off-Broadway run at St. Ann’s Warehouse in New York, and received a 2026 Obie Award Special Citation for its ensemble. Her recent U.S. stage credits include a leading role in Sanaz Toossi’s Wish You Were Here at ArtsWest in Seattle. Azarhoush recently made her directorial debut with the short film Death of a Seagull, selected for LA Shorts International Film Festival and Linz International Short Film Festival in Austria.

Follow Ainaz Azarhoush

*Limit 6 tickets per household. Not valid on Opening Night or previously purchased tickets. When buying online, enter the code at the top of the page and click SUBMIT before selecting your seats. Discount will be applied at checkout.