Introducing writer, poet, performer and former strip-club waitress Sabrina Mahfouz, who plays the TakeOver Festival 2012 in York tomorrow.

In Sabrina Hahfouz’s debut one-woman show Dry Ice, Nina’s world is crazy. Amid strip-club mermaids, lascivious list-keepers and serial throat-slitters, she is paid £20 a pop to take her knickers off, then goes home to a boyfriend who describes himself as half-drug dealer, half-art dealer, but is no good at either.

Her super-religious mum knows nothing of all of this and she’s on her way to stay. Telling wild and wonderful stories is the only way Nina can stay sane – but for how long?

Charles Hutchinson puts his questions to writer-performer Sabrina Mahfouz while she is in Istanbul earlier this week for the World Economic Forum – and yes, she will return to Britain in time for tonight’s performance at York Theatre Royal.

What was the inspiration for your play, set in a world of strippers and drug dealers, Sabrina?

“I worked in strip clubs as a waitress through five years of my under- and post-graduate university courses.

“Around three years after leaving the industry, I’d begun performing poetry around the country and particularly in London. I realised so many of my poems were about strip clubs that I should try and get it all out of my system in one go. It worked, but now I have hardly any time to write new poems!

“The issue of stripping becoming normalised (a default component of a stag night, for example) and the exponential rise of the industry over the last few years, coupled with the statements from young women that stripping was something they aspired to for financial and empowerment reasons, propelled me to offer an entertaining account of the world, which hopes to go a little deeper and make people think.”

Describe the play in a nutshell.

“It tells the story of 24-year-old stripper Nina and 18 other characters from her world of surreal and sleazy clubs and gentrified Ladbroke Grove dinner parties.

“I tell it like it really is (and isn’t), both on and off the pole, but Dry Ice is not just a strip-club exposé. It’s a story of a young girl trying to find her place in the world and so it becomes about reality; illusion; hope; disappointment; sex; power and the voyeur in all of us.

“It’s also quite funny.”

Explain the title, Dry Ice.

“The phrase is used within the play when the main character is describing entering the strip club where she works: ‘emerald clouds of dry ice under azure lasers...’.

“Something about it sprang out at me as a catchy name on a marketing level. On a metaphorical level, I think it describes the world of strip clubs well – not only as an oxymoron and something which is impossible to find in the natural world, but also because everything is an illusion, thinly veiled in this soft smoke.

“I also like that it could sound like ‘dry eyes’. There’s even more but I think I’d be stretching it, as an ex-English Lit student could easily do!”

What is the power but also the danger of telling wild and wonderful stories, as Nina does?

“The power of stories is huge. Everyone uses them – from musicians to politicians. I’m at the World Economic Forum and almost all the political and business leaders have been employing personal stories in order to get across their points and engage the audience.

“Nina knows that her stories have power; they allow people into a world they don’t always admit they want access to. They test people – how much are they really willing to believe? How far will they suspend their disbelief in order to fulfil their preconceptions and desire for new knowledge? They make people need her.

“The danger with her stories is that they have become so much a part of her identity, that she is not sure who she is without them.”

How important is a festival such as TakeOver, in which York Theatre Royal puts the emphasis on young practitioners?

“So important! Both on stage and back stage. For young people to be getting the opportunity to put the things on that they want to see/want others to see is essential for theatre to grow and develop in the UK.

“If there were more opportunities like TakeOver, I’m sure young artists, especially those who have less traditional approaches, would feel encouraged to take more risks.

“Young people tend to programme things that truly reflect the world we’re living in – something that I think is sometimes lacking.”

What are you working on at present?

”I’m finishing up my new play, One Hour Only, directed by Matt Wilde. It recently won the Old Vic New Voices Edinburgh Award, so it will be presented by Made From Scratch Theatre at the Underbelly in the Edinburgh Fringe throughout August this year.

“I’m also working on a short film inspired by Dry Ice and a new solo show, ZainabChloeKatya, which will be on at Latitude Festival in July.”

How come Friends star David Schwimmer has directed the show?

"I met David many years ago when waitressing at a nightclub called The Cuckoo Club in London. He also met (and eventually married) one of my friends and colleagues, photographer Zoe Buckman. He'd always shown an interest in my writing and would give feedback on pieces. When he read Dry Ice, he was eager to get involved - so he did and was absolutely essential to my being able to take it from page to stage."

What have you been doing at the World Eonomic Forum this week?

" I was at the World Economic Forum's first ever meeting on Middle East, North Africa and Eurasia in Istanbul as I'm a WEF Global Shaper: people under 30 chosen to represent their cities as potential leaders of the future in their field.

"If you follow me on twitter @SabrinaMahfouz, you can read about the fascinating meetings I attended with heads of state and business – from the CEO of Coca-Cola to the PM of Turkey. I was there to learn and contribute in my areas of specific interest: women's development and the role of culture as an agent for change."

• Sabrina Mahfouz in Dry Ice, TakeOver Festival 2012, The Studio, York Theatre Royal, tomorrow, 8pm. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk