About Anna O’Donoghue

Anna is a New York City native who graduated from the Juilliard School with a BFA in Drama. Her primary training is in classical performance. Her primary interest is in new work. 

Since graduating from drama school, she has participated—both as an actor, and as a dramaturg—in a myriad of readings, workshops, and development processes of plays and films. Now, she reads and comments on more than 250 new plays, pilots, and screenplays every year. She currently serves as the Literary Manager and Artistic Producer of the American Playwriting Foundation, which administers the “Relentless” Award, the largest blind monetary prize for a new American play or musical; the Award has recognized multiple Pulitzer Prize finalists and plays that have gone onto national productions and critical acclaim. 

In 2022, she was the production dramaturg for a celebrated production of Skin of Our Teeth at the Everyman Theater in Baltimore; Anna created a 10 actor (and puppet!) adaptation for the sprawling, classic play that was approved and applauded by the Wilder estate.

From 2018-2023, she served as Chair of Arts in the Armed Forces’ (AITAF) Bridge Awards, a playwriting and screenwriting prize that recognized exceptional talent within the incredible diversity of the military community. Head Judges for the Bridge Awards included: Suzan-Lori Parks, Tony Kushner, David Henry Hwang, Nancy Meyers, and Paula Vogel. Anna lead the script recruitment and evaluation process, which focused on inclusivity of new artists; all submitting writers were invited to request and receive feedback on their work, and she served as dramaturg for winning playwrights as they developed their scripts.

She is the Literary Manager of Lesser America, an off-Broadway theater company that develops and presents new work; they have produced 10 plays at venues across New York City, including world premieres by Caroline McGraw, Brian Watkins, and Lauren Yee. 

As a freelance consultant, she has worked with artists on plays, screenplays, pilots, and other projects that have gone onto production at major regional theaters, television studios, and audio platforms. 

As a writer, Anna has had plays developed and produced in New York, New Orleans, and New Mexico. She has been a semi-finalist for the Women’s Project and the O’Neill Festival, and, in her finest moment, she was served with a cease and desist letter from Jeremy Piven for her play The Piven Monologues, co-written with Alena Smith. She has done freelance work as a speechwriter, copywriter and editor, ghostwriter, and journalist. For five years, she was a staff writer at Hunter College, where she worked with professors, students, and administrators on writing projects of all stripes.

A weird audio piece that she wrote and directed was released by Audible.  

Anna likes making and eating soup and she is an acclaimed pet sitter.