Susanna is a writer and director for film and television, and documentary filmmaker whose latest documentary short, MY FATHER’S NAME, is on the 2024-25 festival circuit. Her documentary feature, Out Of My Head, premiered in MoMA's Doc Fortnight and went on to win Best International Documentary at the Melbourne Documentary Film festival. Her dramatic short, House Of Teeth, which she wrote and directed, won numerous awards on the festival circuit, aired on Shorts TV, and is available on Amazon. She directed several episodes of Brooke Adams and Lynne Adams' web series All Downhill From Here.
Susanna's debut feature, Sony Pictures' Shadrach, starring Harvey Keitel and Andie MacDowell, premiered at the Venice Film Festival and was one of New York Press critic Armond White's top ten films of the year. Susanna wrote and directed for Sidney Lumet's TV series 100 Centre Street, and wrote for Tom Fontana's Borgia, and the Canadian series Lonesome Dove. She co-authored (with Bridget Terry) several TV movies for Hallmark Hall of Fame and Lifetime, including an adaptation of Ann Tyler's Back When We Were Grown-Ups, with Blythe Danner, Peter Fonda and Faye Dunaway; and the award-winning Taking Back Our Town, with Ruby Dee.
Susanna's other documentary credits as writer/director include 9/12: From Chaos to Community; In Our Own Backyards; and Suspended Sentence. She was an Associate Producer of FDR, for ABC-TV's documentary division, Close-Up.
Her personal essays have appeared in The Yale Revue, SPIN Magazine, The New York Times and Real Simple magazine.
Susanna serves on the Executive Committee of the Writers Guild Initiative; and the Special Projects Committee of the Directors Guild of America.
She currently has projects in development with The Levinson/Fontana Company, Cinetic Media, and EP/Showrunner Matt Lopez ("Promised Land," "Father of the Bride").
