SAN FRANCISCO: Playwrights Foundation has named Jessica Bird Beza their new executive artistic director, effective Oct. 1. Beza succeeds Amy Mueller in the role.

“Jessica is a talented and thoughtful community-builder who is demonstrably committed to fostering artists and advancing the new play field,” said Markham Miller, president of Playwrights Foundation’s board of directors, in a statement. “Jessica is primed to lead Playwrights into our next decade of local and national impacts.”

Bird Beza has worked in directing and producing positions at La Jolla Playhouse, as well as at the Old Globe and Mo’olelo Performing Arts Company, both in San Diego, Calif. Bird Beza also served as the National New Play Network producer in residence at the San Diego Repertory Theatre. A graduate of the University of San Diego (M.A., nonprofit leadership and management), Bird Beza is the associate director of the musical Come From Away, starting with the La Jolla Playhouse production to Broadway. She has also directed projects at San Diego Repertory Theatre, La Jolla Playhouse, Theatreworks Silicon Valley, American Conservatory Theatre, New Village Arts, and Playwrights Foundation, among others.

“I am honored to be selected as Playwrights Foundation’s new executive artistic director and look forward to building upon its rich legacy of championing diverse contemporary playwrights,” said Bird Beza in a statement. “I aim to increase our footprint in sustaining theatre as a vital and dynamic art form through supporting emerging playwrights locally and nationally.”

Founded in 1976, Playwrights Foundation is one of the top new play incubators in the U.S., serving emerging and mid-career playwrights from the Bay Area and around the country.