photo credit Andrew Blumenthal
Bio
Francesca Root-Dodson is a writer and actress based in New York City. She’s worked for Houghton Mifflin, McSweeney’s and THE BELIEVER in the world of literary prose, and written original content—as well as been brought on to do rewrites—for film and television. In 2013, her short story “Strayers” was a finalist for the Nelson Algren Award and published in the CHICAGO TRIBUNE. In 2016, she developed an episodic series entitled ROSELAND, a comedy about a delusional drug addict who thinks the world is ending. Both ROSELAND and the feature adaptation of “Strayers” were finalists for the 2016 Sundance Labs. In 2019, Francesca wrote, directed and starred in her first feature film, FREE SPIRIT, a New York City un-love story inspired by Woody Allen and the French New Wave, which had a festival run and amassed over 1.4 million views on NoBudge, the indie streaming site. She has written three plays: ESCALATION TIME, TONGUES and REAL GOOD FOR FREE. In the fall of 2024, a workshop production of REAL GOOD FOR FREE was held in a Manhattan apartment. ESCALATION TIME will have its off-off Broadway premiere in November 2025 at Studio 17.
As an actress, she played Bridget (with the ludicrously capacious bag) on the final season of SUCCESSION, as well as the Harley Quinn character on Fox’s GOTHAM. She has appeared in the Oscar-winning short “God of Love” and Tamara Jenkins’ film PRIVATE LIFE, as well as the television shows THE NIGHT AGENT, BLACKLIST, FBI and BLUE BLOODS, among others. In film, she’s appeared in REBEL IN THE RYE, A NEW YORK STORY, THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY and DOCTOR, DOCTOR.
Francesca is also a co-host of the politics and culture podcast “Critical Babe Theory.” She graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Columbia University with a degree in Creative Writing.