Anya Pearson

Anya Pearson is an award-winning actress, playwright, poet, essayist, screenwriter, producer, and activist. She was honored to receive the 2019 Problem Play Commission from B&B and to be sharing the stage with this beautifully diverse collection of artists who have given so much of themselves to bringing this story to life. She was the inaugural winner of the $10,000 Voice is a Muscle Grant from the Corporeal Voices Foundation run by best-selling author Lidia Yuknavitch. Her play, Made to Dance in Burning Buildings, was called “not only a powerful lament, but a brave, epic and steadfast tale of rebirth,” by Willamette Week. “Pearson’s creation exists in a completely different galaxy than most theatrical works.” Made to Dance in Burning Buildings played to a sold out house at Joe’s Pub at The Public Theater (NYC), which was co-produced by Wednesday Sue Derrico’s company, and received its World Premiere at Shaking The Tree Theatre where Anya was the Playwright-in-Residence for the 2018-2019 season. She is working on a series of projects (in addition to Made to Dance) aimed at empowering other survivors of sexual violence (especially survivors of color), raising awareness around the lasting effects of PTSD and trauma, and fighting back against rape culture. She received the 2018 commission from Orphic to adapt Agamemnon with an African-American lens. Anya was also a finalist for the National Black Theatre’s 2019 “I Am Soul” Playwriting Residency. She runs a production company called Urban Haiku whose mission is to produce groundbreaking work that transcends the traditional boundaries of theatre while also serving as the catalyst for art and community action to combine for real social change. Anya is a proud member of LineStorm Playwrights. As an actor, she has appeared in numerous regional theatre productions, commercials, and independent films and is a member of Actors’ Equity Association. She is a graduate of the two-year acting program at the William Esper Studio in New York City and a graduate of the writing program at Marylhurst University. She would like to thank her husband and her mother for their tremendous support. Her best production is her 7-year-old daughter, Aidee, who can be seen, most nights, trying to circumvent bedtime by asking deep philosophical questions like: “When are we going to see the world? When is my life going to truly begin?”