Banafshe Hourmazdi was born in 1990 in the Ruhr area and lives in Berlin. In 2008/09 she performed at Ruhrtriennale and at the Berlin Theatertreffen in Eine Kirche der Angst vor dem Fremden in mir, directed by Christoph Schlingensief. From 2009 to 2012 she studied acting at the Akademie für Darstellende Kunst Baden-Württemberg, followed by a Master’s degree in acting at the Zurich University of the Arts (2012-2015). In 2013 she founded the theatre collective »Technocandy«. Hourmazdi made guest appearances with several plays at the »Körber Studio Junge Regie« as well as at the »Fast Forward Festival« at the Staatstheater Braunschweig. In 2015, she won the Newcomer Prize of the City of Vienna with »Technocandy« for her production Nase läuft at Theater Drachengasse. She has also appeared on stage at the Lucerne Theatre, the Münchner Kammerspiele, Ballhaus Nauynstraße and the Sophiensaele, among others.
She played a leading role in the web comedy series Der Wedding kommt (2016). Hourmazdi played her first leading role in cinema in Futur Drei (2019). For this role, Hourmazdi received the Götz George Young Talent Award at the 2019 First Steps Awards, along with her co-stars Benjamin Radjaipour and Eidin Seyed Jalali. In 2021 she was selected as a Berlinale Talent and plays the lead role in the new ZDFneo series Loving Her (directed by Leonie Krippendorff).
At the Maxim Gorki Theater she is starring in the theatre film DARK ROOM revisited, which will premiere as part of Queer Week 2021.
