Bridget Flanery

Bridget Christine Flanery (born March 24, 1970) is an American actress and screenplay writer. She is sometimes credited as Bridget Flanery-Fownes.

Early life and education Born Bridget Christine Flanery, on March 24, 1970 in Guthrie Center, Iowa, Flanery is the daughter of Judith and James Flanery, the latter of whom was a county district clerk in Guthrie County before his death in 1987. Flanery has a sister, Jill, and three brothers, James, William and John.

Flanery attended Guthrie Center Elementary School, where she was receiving accolades for her acting as early as 1982. In high school, she starred as Anne Sullivan in The Miracle Worker at the age of 15, winning the role over several older students. After graduation, she relocated to Los Angeles to pursue a career in acting. She later received her MFA from Yale School of Drama.

Career While a student at Drake University, Flanery appeared in several local productions at Wichita Summer Theater, including Blithe Spirit, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, To Gillian on her 37th Birthday, Fatal Attraction, and Nunsense. She also appeared in several commercials while in college.

Upon graduating from Drake, Flanery moved to LA and booked her first television role playing a high school student in Sweet Dreams. She was part of the main cast until 1996, when she was replaced by Shirlee Elliot. Between 1996 and 1998, she portrayed Jill on the sitcom Sabrina the Teenage Witch.

Flanery has appeared in several guest starring television roles, including Teen Angel, Unhappily Ever After, Love Boat: The Next Wave, Will & Grace, Desperate Housewives, Boy Meets World, Out of Practice, Without a Trace, Hart of Dixie, Babylon 5, All My Children, Guiding Light, Pearl and Two and a Half Men. She went on to have many more theater roles throughout the 2000s, including A Streetcar Named Desire at the Yale Repertory Theatre, Loves and Hours at the Old Globe Theatre, Cats Talk Back at the New York International Fringe Festival, Twelfth Night at the Shakespeare Festival LA, Spring Awakening at the Clemente Soto Velez Cultural Center, The Rainmaker at The Noise Within, The Taming of the Shrew at The Odyssey, The Psychic at The Falcon Theater, The Road to Appomattox at Colony Theater, New York Water at the Pico Playhouse.

In 2009, Flanery starred in a film directed by her old Drake classmate, Sean Gannon. The film, Something Blue, was screened at the Starz Denver Film Festival, and filmed in Flanery's native Iowa.

Flanery wrote the screenplay for the 2020 film, Gossamer Folds, which tells the story of a transgender woman befriending her young neighbour in the 1980s. The film was shown at several festivals, and was nominated for the 2022 GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Film: Limited Release.

From 2019-2023, Flanery taught acting at The Studio School in Los Angeles. She has also taught acting classes at Drake University since 2015.

Filmography