Mandi Riggi is a British–American, London-based writer-director of Iranian descent. She is a member of the WGA, WGGB, BAFTA Connect, and Directors UK.
Mandi is the writer and creator of the television series CRIMSON CROWN, executive produced by Dario Argento and currently in development with German broadcaster ZDF and Media Musketeers. The series was selected for the Rome MIA Market’s Drama Pitch Series in 2022. Her pilot PEACE X PIECE was optioned by Showtime, and her screenplay MERCY, adapted from her Hollywood Fringe Diversity Scholarship-winning play, was selected for EAVE, TIFF’s IFF programme, Film London’s PFM, and the MIA Co-Production Market.
Her pilot ALEX IN WONDERLAND was one of sixteen projects chosen for MIA Market’s Drama Pitch Series and is now in development.
She is an alumna of the Serial Eyes 2020/21 showrunning programme in Berlin and was selected for Directors UK’s Inspire scheme, where she was mentored by and shadowed director Paul Gay.
As a playwright and theatre director, Mandi has written and directed multiple productions. Her play MERCY premiered at the Hollywood Fringe (recipient of the Diversity Scholarship), and her play LEVITICUS ran Off-Broadway at 59E59 to sold-out houses before transferring to the Edinburgh Fringe.
She has directed plays in New York, Los Angeles, and London, including Venus in Fur at Camden People’s Theatre, which earned praise for its precision and nuanced power dynamics, and most recently The Sea Horse, a Drama Desk Award-winning play that premiered in London to rave reviews and won an Offie Award for Best Performance.
As a filmmaker, Mandi has directed several acclaimed short films. Her short SPADE, starring Jorge Garcia (Lost, Hawaii 5.0), premiered at the Katra Film Series, won the Katra Award, and now streams on ShortsTV. Her short Parallel Passage was nominated for Best Short at the Deauville Festival of American Cinema and screened at thirteen international festivals including Hamptons, São Paulo, Huesca, San Diego, and Los Angeles.
Mandi is currently developing the feature adaptation of MERCY, with a star cast attached, alongside a slate of new film and TV projects. As a producer, she participated in the Rotterdam Producers Lab with her feature project EVIN. She is also developing a new stage version of MERCY for a London production.
She is the founder of The Tribe Collective, a community of storytellers and theatre ensemble, which received an artist residency grant from Hawkwood College and the F.W. Reckitt Arts Trust, where she recently workshopped her dance-theatre piece A Baby’s Arm Holding an Apple. Through Tribe Collective, she also created and produces CRADLE: Stories of Iran, Exile & Longing, an ongoing new-writing initiative in partnership with Riverside Studios, bringing writers and artists together through dramaturgy, rehearsal and collaborative practice.