Ally Merkel is a Brooklyn-based playwright and performer. Her work has most recently been seen onstage at The Tank, The Fled Collective, New Perspectives Theatre Company’s Meganne George Women’s Work Short Play Festival, the StageFemmes One-Act Festival, and online with The 24 Hour Plays Viral Monologues. She has developed plays with the Under Construction Playwrights Group at The Road Theatre Company and with The COOP’s Clusterf**ck vol 3 working group. Ally is a 2023 Seven Devils Conference finalist and a 24 Hour Plays: Nationals alumna. Beyond writing for the stage, Ally’s comedic writing has been featured in Points in Case, The Belladonna, and Edutopia, her academic writing has been published by The Yale Review of International Studies and the Brookings Institution, and she has written and produced episodes of the podcast Many Roads to Here. Ally also acts and has performed comedy with various improv and sketch groups in Ohio, Oregon, D.C., and New York. She has a BA in political science from Kenyon College and is currently pursuing an MFA in dramatic writing at NYU.