Scoop: Resident Raconteur

Meet the director bringing multicultural storytelling, authentic accents and therapeutic improv to The Phoenix Theatre Company.

A few years ago, The Phoenix Theatre Company was growing rapidly but couldn’t yet afford long-term dialect coaches to teach actors crackerjack Cockney brogues and sweet Southern drawls. Luckily, they had someone waiting in the wings who spoke Farsi, French and Italian, plus collected regional patois after overcoming a French accent that rivaled Pepé Le Pew’s.

That person was Pasha Yamotahari. Since joining The Phoenix Theatre Company in 2009, Yamotahari has taken on numerous roles, including Associate Producing Director, dramaturge, dialect coach, and fight choreographer. Whatever he’s doing, he strives to “always be an authentic, truthful, original storyteller with a unique voice… and to inspire others to tell their stories.”