ANNALEIGH ASHFORD
Tony Award-winning and Emmy and Grammy Award-nominated actor Annaleigh Ashford has spent her career collaborating with acclaimed directors and actors across stage, film and television and she continues that award-winning work with several upcoming projects.
Ashford is currently on Broadway in All In: Comedy About Love for a limited engagement, and next will star opposite Dennis Quaid in “Happy Face” for Paramount+ that premieres on March 20. The series is inspired by the podcast of the same name, that itself was based on Melissa Moore’s autobiography Shattered Silence. Ashford will play Melissa, who discovered at age 15 that her beloved father was the prolific serial killer known as “Happy Face.” As an adult, she has changed her name and guarded her secret while her father has been serving life in prison. The series is executive produced by Robert and Michelle King and Michael Showalter will direct the pilot episode.
She will next star in Searchlight Pictures’ horror thriller, Dust, opposite Sarah Paulson and Ebon Moss-Bachrach. The film follows a woman who is trapped by increasingly deadly dust storms while haunted by her past. The film will stream on Disney’s DTC platforms as a Hulu Original.
Ashford recently completed her run on Broadway opposite Josh Groban in the Tony-nominated revival of Stephen Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre. Her performance as Mrs. Lovett has earned her a Tony Award nomination for “Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Musical” and a Grammy Award nomination for “Best Musical Theater Album.” She won the Drama Desk Award for “Outstanding Lead Performance in a Musical” and the Drama League Award for “The Distinguished Performance Award” for her role. Set in Victorian London, Sweeney Todd tells the penny dreadful tale of a murderous, revenge-seeking barber and his pie-baking accomplice Mrs. Lovett, who uses her culinary skills to dispose of bothersome corpses. The team behind Hamilton, producer, Jeffrey Seller and director, Thomas Kail, helms the production. Ashford is one of very few actresses, among them Bernadette Peters, Patti LuPone, and Angela Lansbury, who have performed in more than one of Sondheim’s Broadway shows.
In 2022, Ashford starred opposite Kumail Nanjiani in the Hulu limited series “Welcome to Chippendales” from creator Robert Siegel. “Chippendales” is the true story of Somen “Steve” Banerjee (Nanjiani), the Indian-American entrepreneur who started the famous male revue show, Chippendales. Ashford plays the series regular role of Irene, an accountant by trade and wife of founder Banerjee, falling in love over a shared passion for tax loopholes and revenue expansion. The role garnered her first Emmy nomination.
Ashford also starred as Paula Jones in Ryan Murphy’s “Impeachment: American Crime Story” in 2021, which unraveled the national crisis that swept up Jones, Monica Lewinsky and Linda Tripp as principal characters in the country’s first impeachment proceedings in over a century. The Los Angeles Times raved “her performance is inflected with humor as well as compassion” and Entertainment Weekly proclaims, “Ashford shines through an elite ensemble.”
Also in television, Ashford starred in two seasons of the hit CBS comedy “B Positive.” Created by Marco Pennette and Chuck Lorre, season two starred some legendary actors like Linda Lavin, Hector Elizondo and Ben Vereen. Matt Roush at TV Insider praised: “It’s about time that someone gave Tony-winning spitfire Annaleigh Ashford a lead role that takes full advantage of her madcap personality and offbeat comic timing.” In 2014, Ashford starred as ‘Betty DiMello’ in Showtime’s Golden Globe®, Emmy®, and Critics’ Choice® nominated series “Masters of Sex.” Ashford also played opposite Hugh Jackman and Allison Janney in HBO’s “Bad Education,” which won a Primetime Emmy® for “Outstanding Television Movie” and was nominated for a Critics Choice® Award. Additionally, she was seen in the Netflix series “Unbelievable,” starring Kaitlyn Dever, Toni Collette and Merritt Weaver.
In 2008 Ashford made her film debut in Sex and the City: The Movie and then appeared in the Jonathan Demme film Rachel Getting Married. Ashford was also in the 2016 independent film Love on the Run, starring Francis Fisher, the 2019 Amazon film Late Night alongside Mindy Kaling and Emma Thompson, and she voiced a troll in Disney’s critically acclaimed and Academy Award® winning animated feature Frozen, opposite Kristen Bell and Idina Menzel. Ashford has had roles in the television shows “The Big C,” “Gifted Man,” “Law & Order,” “Nurse Jackie,” “Smash,” and “The Good Fight.”
On Broadway, Annaleigh garnered a Tony Award, a Drama Desk Award and an Outer Critics’ Circle Award for her portrayal of ‘Essie Carmichael’ in the 2014 Broadway revival of You Can’t Take It With You. She starred opposite Jake Gyllenhaal in Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Broadway production of Sunday in the Park with George. The show was slated to play a limited engagement on London’s West End in June 2020, but has since been postponed due to the global pandemic. Ashford made her debut as the original ‘Margot’ in the 2007 production of Legally Blonde: The Musical. Following, she starred as ‘Glinda’ in the 2003 Broadway production of Wicked and ‘Jeannie’ in the 2009 critically acclaimed revival of Hair. Ashford also originated the role of ‘Lauren’ in Kinky Boots, a performance for which she received a Tony nomination in 2014. Other theatrical roles include ‘Marcie’ in Joe Mantello’s 2012 musical Dog Fight and ‘Maureen’ in the Michael Greif 2011 Off-Broadway revival of Rent, for which she was nominated for a Drama League Award and Clive Barnes Award.
In 2015, Ashford starred in a cabaret performance titled Annaleigh Ashford – Lost in the Stars at ‘54 Below’ in New York City. The critically acclaimed show was musically directed by Will Van Dyke.
Born and raised in Denver, Ashford now splits her time between Los Angeles and New York.
With a career that has spanned thirty-eight Broadway seasons, LaChanze consistently brings women of complexity and triumph into the cultural lexicon.
