John Anthony Loffredo

John Anthony Loffredo is a Los Angeles based playwright whose work explores the intersection of queerness and survival. He made his professional playwriting debut in 2025 with the world premiere of his play, FROU-FROU: A MENAGERIE OF SORTS, at Boston Court Pasadena directed by Zi Alikhan. He has previously developed work as a member of Under Construction at the Road Theatre, Boston Court Pasadena's Playwrights Group, and Clusterf**k at the Coop NYC. John Anthony is a former O'Neill semi-finalist, Lambda Literary fellow, and recipient of the Nancy Garden Scholarship. Their work as an essayist has been published in Condé Nast's LGBTQ+ publication, them, and is shared regularly on their Substack, late to the party. John Anthony is also a two-time AIDS/LifeCycle rider, cycling from San...

John Anthony Loffredo is a Los Angeles based playwright whose work explores the intersection of queerness and survival. He made his professional playwriting debut in 2025 with the world premiere of his play, FROU-FROU: A MENAGERIE OF SORTS, at Boston Court Pasadena directed by Zi Alikhan. He has previously developed work as a member of Under Construction at the Road Theatre, Boston Court Pasadena's Playwrights Group, and Clusterf**k at the Coop NYC. John Anthony is a former O'Neill semi-finalist, Lambda Literary fellow, and recipient of the Nancy Garden Scholarship. Their work as an essayist has been published in Condé Nast's LGBTQ+ publication, them, and is shared regularly on their Substack, late to the party. John Anthony is also a two-time AIDS/LifeCycle rider, cycling from San Francisco to Los Angeles with thousands of others to raise awareness and millions of dollars to support community members living with HIV/AIDS.

John Anthony holds a BFA in Drama from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts

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Scripts

Frou-Frou: A Menagerie of Sorts

by John Anthony Loffredo

2
Cast Size
4
Genre
comedy,
dark comedy,
drama,
farce,
satire

L is a stoner with social anxiety, Harold is an aspiring ballerina, and their mother is a woman from another time. Driven by archaic dreams for her children, all Mamma wants is for a man to marry L to rescue the family from financial ruin. So when a big, burly traveler turns up at their doorstep, she thinks her prayers have been answered. But it is Harold, her tutu-wearing son, who seems most attracted to this...

L is a stoner with social anxiety, Harold is an aspiring ballerina, and their mother is a woman from another time. Driven by archaic dreams for her children, all Mamma wants is for a man to marry L to rescue the family from financial ruin. So when a big, burly traveler turns up at their doorstep, she thinks her prayers have been answered. But it is Harold, her tutu-wearing son, who seems most attracted to this strange man, while L, her chronically online “daughter,” doesn’t seem to want him – but wants to become him.

By turns raucous, poetic, touching, and dangerous, Frou-Frou: A Menagerie of Sorts riffs on Tennessee Williams’s The Glass Menagerie in this story of two queer siblings yearning to be understood.

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the freedom from everything rotten

by John Anthony Loffredo

2
Cast Size
6
Genre
comedy,
fable/folktale,
farce,
satire

A glimmering lake. Four naked men giggling. Each of them surviving off of sweet fruits and thick honey. Everything is wonderful until…from the depths of the water, emerges a man covered in sludge! This gay oasis becomes something of a nightmare as the four men disagree over what to do with this filthy stranger. But none of them are sure where he came from, not even the Sludge Man himself. All he knows is...that...

A glimmering lake. Four naked men giggling. Each of them surviving off of sweet fruits and thick honey. Everything is wonderful until…from the depths of the water, emerges a man covered in sludge! This gay oasis becomes something of a nightmare as the four men disagree over what to do with this filthy stranger. But none of them are sure where he came from, not even the Sludge Man himself. All he knows is...that he’s been lusting after them for a while. the freedom from everything rotten dares us to imagine a gay community untouched by sex…until it is.

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how to prepare for an existential crisis

by John Anthony Loffredo

1
Cast Size
6
Genre
dark comedy

Told in reverse chronological order, how to prepare for an existential crisis, begins at the bitter end of an unknown climate catastrophe as two lone workers stand in front of a conveyor belt lined with dead bodies. As KEY and her co-worker, CARLOS, inspect the bodies for anything valuable...CARLOS grills KEY about her love life. Though the backdrop is hellish, their conversation remains quotidian--the last...

Told in reverse chronological order, how to prepare for an existential crisis, begins at the bitter end of an unknown climate catastrophe as two lone workers stand in front of a conveyor belt lined with dead bodies. As KEY and her co-worker, CARLOS, inspect the bodies for anything valuable...CARLOS grills KEY about her love life. Though the backdrop is hellish, their conversation remains quotidian--the last vestige of normalcy. But when KEY recognizes the body she's inspecting, her world unravels and the play moves backward in time, slowly revealing how the chaos of a changing world got her separated from TYLER and SWEETIE, her best friends. Consumed with regret, KEY tries desperately to find her way "home".

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I Love You, Jesus Christ!

by John Anthony Loffredo

Cast Size
6
Genre
comedy,
dark comedy,
drama,
faith-based,
farce,
parody/spoof,
romantic comedy,
satire

Jesus and Judas are in love...until God intervenes. Jesus is forced to abandon Judas and set off on a path to carry out God’s mission. Fame, followers, and a mischievous group of marketers all get in the way of Judas' attempts to remind Jesus of what really matters. I Love You, Jesus Christ! is a queer, radical re-imagining of how Jesus’ ascent into stardom leaves Judas searching for something to believe in.

Jesus and Judas are in love...until God intervenes. Jesus is forced to abandon Judas and set off on a path to carry out God’s mission. Fame, followers, and a mischievous group of marketers all get in the way of Judas' attempts to remind Jesus of what really matters. I Love You, Jesus Christ! is a queer, radical re-imagining of how Jesus’ ascent into stardom leaves Judas searching for something to believe in.