Playwright and stage director born in Palermo, she graduated in 1990 from the Accademia Nazionale d’Arte Drammatica “Silvio d’Amico” in Rome. In 1999, she founded the company Sud Costa Occidentale in Palermo, with which she won the Premio Scenario 2001 for mPalermu and the Ubu Award 2002 for Best New Italian Play. In 2001 she received the Premio Lo Straniero as an emerging director, in 2003 the Ubu Award for Carnezzeria, in 2004 the Gassman Award for Best Italian Director and the Critics’ Award of the ANCT (Italian National Association of Theatre Critics), in 2005 the Golden Graal for Medea, and in 2009 the Sinopoli Award for Culture. That same year, she opened the season of Teatro alla Scala with Carmen conducted by Daniel Barenboim. From 2011 she toured with La trilogia degli occhiali, and in 2012 she made her debut at the Opéra Comique in Paris with Auber’s La muette de Portici (Abbiati Award 2014). This was followed by Verso Medea (2012), Via Castellana Bandiera (Venice Film Festival 2013), and Strauss’s Feuersnot (2014). She served as Artistic Director of the 67th Cycle of Classical Performances at the Teatro Olimpico in Vicenza, and in 2014 created Le sorelle Macaluso, which received the Le Maschere del Teatro Italiano Award, the Critics’ Award, and two Ubu Awards. In 2015 she opened the Teatro Massimo season with Henze’s Gisela! and in 2016 made her debut at the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma with Rossini’s La Cenerentola. Subsequent productions include Macbeth (Teatro Massimo 2017), Bestie di scena (Teatro Strehler 2017), the diptych La voix humaine/Cavalleria rusticana conducted by Michele Mariotti (Bologna, 2017), La scortecata (Spoleto, 2017), and Eracle (Syracuse, 2018). In 2019 she debuted at the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma with Prokofiev’s The Fiery Angel and at La Colline – Théâtre National in Paris with Fable pour un adieu, freely inspired by Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid. In 2020 she premiered Misericordia at the Piccolo Teatro and in 2021 Pupo di zucchero at Pompeii. Between 2022 and 2023 she directed Scarpette rotte, Il tango delle capinere, La bohème, Iphigenia in Tauris, I vespri siciliani, Dialogues des Carmélites and Rusalka. In 2023 she created Re Chicchinella, which premiered at the Piccolo Teatro Studio Melato in Milan, later revived in 2024 at the Teatro San Ferdinando in Naples and in 2025 at the Teatro Argentina in Rome.