Mandy Pennington is a writer, marketer, teacher, and actor based in Northeastern Pennsylvania.
Mandy has over 15 years of experience in the digital marketing space and advises businesses, non-profits, and startups. She teaches courses in marketing and communications at several universities. She is also an award-winning actor and playwright with performance credits in the U.S. and Ireland. She recently completed her MFA in the Maslow Family Graduate Program in Creative Writing at Wilkes University and her coming-of-age memoir, Gateways, is forthcoming from Vine Leaves Press. Her solo play adapted from her memoir, Girl Walks Into a Movie Theater, has been produced in Pennsylvania and New York.
Current Projects
Here's what I've been working on.
Gateways: A Memoir
Gateways: A Memoir is a hilarious and heart-wrenching coming-of-age memoir of Pennington’s teenage years and search for identity set against the backdrop of the decaying movie theater she grew up in.
This book is a love letter to a weird and wonderful place and time that will never be again. From her mother’s teenage pregnancy, divorce, and devastating traumatic brain injury to Pennington’s first encounters with love, loss, and dead rodents in the popcorn, The Gateway saw it all.
It was the best/worst first job anyone could ask for.
Girl Walks Into a Movie Theater
A solo coming-of-age play set against the backdrop of a much-beloved but decaying movie theater
Written & Performed by Mandy Pennington
Directed by Simone Daniel
Performances:
- July 2024 – Scranton, PA
- July 2025 – Narrowsburg, NY
- February 2026 – Scranton, PA (to be announced)
Interested in seeing the performance or booking this show at your venue? Contact boyle(dot)mandy(at)gmail.com.
Ulysses of Scranton
“Ulysses of Scranton” is a loose, loving adaptation of James Joyce’s “Ulysses”, creatively reimagined through the distinct lens of Northeast Pennsylvania. This original theatrical production (written by Conor Kelly O’Brien and produced by Scranton Fringe) takes the core narrative of Joyce’s epic and infuses it with local voices, humor, and lived experience.
At its center is a group of actors attempting to stage the “impossible” novel—only to find that as they dive deeper into the text, fiction and reality begin to blur. Characters morph, timelines collapse, and the stage becomes a liminal space where Scranton meets Dublin in surprising and poignant ways.
With a fast-paced blend of wit, heart, and homage, “Ulysses of Scranton” explores identity, memory, and what it means to adapt—on the page, on the stage, and in life. Both an accessible gateway to Joyce and a celebration of regional storytelling, this fast-paced new work proves the classics can still speak—loudly and locally.
“Ulysses of Scranton” has been produced both in the U.S. and internationally as part of a cultural exchange with the Ballina Arts Centre. The cast includes: Mandy Pennington, Simone Daniel, Colin Holmes, Conor McGuigan, and Kimmie Leff.
Selected Press: Western People, WVIA, NEPA Scene, Mayo News, Scranton Times-Tribune
Currents in the Electric City: A Scranton Anthology
Pennington’s essay, “What Washed Windows Can Do” appears in Currents in the Electric City: A Scranton Anthology (Belt Publishing).
In the piece, Pennington explores the nature of change and possibility through the lens of a reimagined local landmark in the downtown: The Marketplace at Steamtown.
Now available for purchase.