Zabbaleen

Engi Wassef

Director, Producer

Engi Wassef was born in Cairo, Egypt and lived there until the age of seven. Her family then immigrated to the U.S. and settled in New York City. She attended Harvard University, and received a B.A. degree magna cum laude in Government with a minor in modern standard Arabic. She worked on Wall St. at the investment firm of Goldman, Sachs & Co. before ultimately leaving to pursue a career in film. She studied film in Paris for three months and then began her M.F.A. at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. She has directed two short narrative films, including Breathtaking Views which won Best Horror Short at the New York International Film and Video Festival, and a short documentary called Social Work which was selected by Academy Award winning director Robert Epstein to be screened at UCLA. She has a profound passion for filmmaking, and excels at bringing challenging subjects to the screen.