Sheila Vand

Sheila Vand was born in a suburb of Los Angeles, but grew up in Palo Alto, California. She is a second-generation Iranian-American. She graduated from the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television, where she studied acting and directing. In 2009, Vand originated the role of Hadia in Rajiv Joseph's Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, which moved to Broadway in 2011. In 2010, she debuted Sneaky Nietzsche, which she called "a live theatrical music experience for the fictionally-inclined." It was described by the Los Angeles Times as "stepping into a living, changing art piece" and by LA Weekly as an "all-encompassing, sensory overload. In a good way." Vand was commissioned by LACMA in 2011 to remount Sneaky Nietzsche.