Directing, Playwriting and Screenwriting
Directing
Annie has directed for professional theatre companies, in university and school settings, and in community. She approaches directing with an actor's sensibility and works in creative collaboration with her actors. She encourages them to take risks and asks questions and dialogues with them to help guide them to deep understanding about their character’s motivation and objectives. She also is very interested in abstract movement and physical expression of storytelling so she incorporates the bodies of her actors through stylized movement, physical improvisation, and devised choreographed moments.
Photo Credit: Michael Kushner
Playwriting and Screenwriting
As a playwright, Annie has had a special interest in writing plays that have been created through the devised collaboration of actors and ensemble members. She works with a company of actors and invites them to tell stories that relate to the theme they are exploring. Then through improvisation and playful experimentation, she takes the material that is generated and weaves it together into an original script - inspired by the work born in the rehearsal studio, but entirely written in her own words and not transcribed. The Red Dress and Memory are examples of this process.
In 2021, she was commissioned by Piper Theatre to be a playwright in their Spotlight Series. She developed her original full length play Memory’s Kiss. Memory’s Kiss is the story of an older couple’s relationship and how it evolves due to Alzeheimers. Their story is mirrored with the story of their daughter’s own marriage. The play is a touching testament and story of how love is present in the midst of great loss, and also how loss is present in the midst of great love.
Also in 2021, Annie wrote and acted in the short film Zoom with Me. Zoom with Me is the story of an unlikely connection that develops between two people desperate for connection in the midst of the pandemic. Zoom with me was accepted into 14 international film festivals.
Directing and Playwriting Highlights:
POLLYWOG
By John McEneny
Directed by Annie Montgomery
Presented at the New Plays For Young Audiences series at New York University at the Provincetown Playhouse.
Presented at University Settlement
Written and Directed By Annie Montgomery
Devised by the Members of A Space Between
Synopsis:
The Red Dress…It started out with a lie. Now, as Erin is looking sex straight in the eye, she’s getting input from all sides: lectures, tweets, even her own past won’t shut up. The Red Dress tells a story every young girl struggles with. Is it time? Will it change me? As Erin wades through all the noise, she makes her way through the past and the present towards a universal issue that we all must face: what is sex all about, and how does it make me who I am?
THIS CAR TRIP SUCKSS
By Catherine Weingarten
Directed by Annie Montgomery
A Piper Theatre Company Production
New Play Development - Emerging Artists
MEMORY
Created and Co-directed by
Annie Montgomery and Lauren Jost
Written by Annie Montgomery
I was awarded the SPARC (Seniors Partnering with Artist Citywide) grant from the Brooklyn Arts Council. The grant allowed me to lead an 8 week storytelling and memoir residency with the seniors at the St. Charles Jubilee Community Center. Once the residency was complete, I worked in collaboration with Lauren Jost's Spellbound Theatre Company and wrote and co-directed the play, Memory, that was performed at the Jalopy Theatre in Brooklyn, NY.
