Anna Younce is a graduate of UC San Diego (BA-Theatre) where she developed her identity as a theatre maker with multiple areas of interest. Highlights include an award-winning Honors Thesis in Playwriting with her first full-length play Self-Talk; Our Town (Asst. Dir. under Kim Walsh); writing, directing, and designing a production of two one-act plays as a studio project (Give Me Something/Whatever You Need).
Since 2019, she has been serving several of San Diego’s beloved theatre companies as a Stage Manager. This includes The Dazzle and Dry Powder, two very unique and challenging film-theatre hybrid projects in 2020-21 with Backyard Renaissance during the time in which artists the world over were experimenting with ways to keep performance alive while reeling from the effects of the Covid pandemic. If asked, she would say that the most unique project of her theatre career has been designing, directing, and stage managing a special Tangled themed wedding procession and ceremony for a friend at the California Center for the Arts in Escondido.
A hallmark year in Anna’s career was 2023, when every production in which she was involved received a nomination in some capacity for the San Diego Theatre Critics Circle’s Craig Noel Awards, including two of the five nominees for Outstanding Dramatic Production: New Fortune Theatre’s Public Enemy and Backyard Renaissance’s August: Osage County, which received the award.
Professional credits include How I Learned to Drive, Proof, August: Osage County, God of Carnage, The October Night of Johnny Zero, Steel Magnolias, Abigail’s Party, Witchland, Dry Powder, The Dazzle, American Buffalo (Stage Manager, Backyard Renaissance); Public Enemy (Stage Manager, New Fortune Theatre Company); gUnTOPIA (Stage Manager, The Roustabouts Theatre Co.); La Bohème (Rehearsal Stage Manager, Opera À la Carte); Written in Stone for Without Walls Festival 2019 (“Tour Guide,” Backyard Renaissance & La Jolla Playhouse).