anne valentino

A queer playwright residing in the DC area, Anne strives for a depiction of humanity that lets itself off the hook—people are going to make mistakes and decisions that can seem flawed at times. She believes that in today’s world one of the toughest things to come by is someone who will let you off the hook, who will say it’s okay to be flawed, it’s okay not to have conquered all of your challenges, it’s okay to have humble dreams. It’s okay… Receiving a PhD in Literature from Temple University, Anne has made writing the center of her professional life for the past twenty years. She’s had plays presented by Baltimore Playwright’s Festival, Rockford New Words, Jersey City Theatre Center, Arts Fort Worth Original Works Series, Philadelphia Artists Collective, Burlington County Footlighters New Works Festival, Project Y Women Theatre Festival (Honor Roll! Monologue Slam), Stella Adler Studio, Creative 360 Art Speaks Festival, among others. She lives with her fiancée and their 2 highly untrainable pups, Tiberius and Athena—Goddess of Wisdom.

SOCIAL MEDIA/WEBSITE
Website: http://anne-valentino.com

MORE ABOUT ME
Why do I keep doing theatre? I came out later in life. Too late to avoid many of the emotional issues that made a huge chunk of my twenties and thirties a blur of self-abnegation. I married my high school sweetheart. I had what you’d call a checkbox kind of life. Colonial house on 2.3 acres – check, yellow lab – check, PTA mom – check, country club membership – check. But it was never a life I fit into. Just a life I faked my way through. And then, when my children grew up, I began to understand that faking one’s way through life was the most empty feeling in the world. I came out just before 40. I eventually met the woman of my dreams…a woman who taught me how to dream. And I began my writing career in earnest. I initially focused on writing poetry and personal essays, tried my hand at a novel or two. But what I found was that these forms of writing, for me at least, were in some ways more of the same—I still felt isolated and alone. And then I began writing plays. The very first time I got to attend a rehearsal and watch what I wrote come alive as embodied by these wonderful actors was absolute nirvana for me. Then when an audience was involved—my god, what bliss! I was enthralled, I was smitten with theatre, I knew I’d found my writing “home.” In the theatre, not only do I get to tell my story (my real story), but I get to do so in a communal way as a member of a "family." I get to truly be a part of something and I get to make art while doing it…now what can be better than that!

WHAT I'M WORKING ON
Currently, a couple of pieces...One is a play about the women scientists and researchers who tried to prove the existence of a Viking Warrior Woman despite the many doubters. And the second is a fictional account of Anne Sexton and the formation of her "band."

KEYWORDS
​Lesbian, queer, LGBTQIA+, magical realism, romantic comedies, dark comedies, absurdist, political activism