Description
The New York Times bestselling essayist Annabelle Gurwitch (I See You Made an Effort) is joined by fellow actress and friend Marisa Tomei (Spider-Man) for an evening of conversation and readings to launch her latest book, You're Leaving When?, a timely and hilarious chronicle of downward mobility, financial and emotional. With performances from the book by actresses Jessica Hecht (Breaking Bad), Marissa Tomei, Julia Sweeney (American Gods), and Charlayne Woodard (Prodigal Son).
Annabelle Gurwitch is so funny that, even when bad things happen, she writes about them in a brilliantly entertaining way. —Dave Barry
Books by Annabelle Gurwitch can be purchased at Strand Book Store.
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This event is available to view with the Symphony Space 20-21 Season Pass. |
To Learn More About the Artists
Annabelle Gurwitch is an actress, activist, and New York Times bestselling author of I See You Made an Effort, which was a Thurber Prize finalist. Additional titles include Wherever You Go, There They Are; You Say Tomato, I Say Shut Up with Jeff Kahn; and Fired!, which was also a Showtime Comedy Special. She’s written for The New Yorker, The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Oprah Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, and Hadassah Magazine, among other publications, and is currently adapting You're Leaving When? for HBO with Bill Maher executive producing, centering on her Los Angeles Times op-ed about hosting an at-risk housing-insecure couple in her home, which was recognized with a 2020 Los Angeles Press Club excellence in journalism award. Gurwitch was the longtime co-host of Dinner & a Movie on TBS; a regular commentator on NPR; host of WA$TED for the Discovery Channel, the news anchor of HBO’s award-winning Not Necessarily the News, and a resident humorist for TheNation.com. Her acting credits include Seinfeld, Murphy Brown, Boston Legal, Dexter, and Melvin Goes to Dinner. She performs on the Moth Mainstage, Carolines on Broadway, and at arts centers around the country. Gurwitch thought she'd be empty-nesting by now; instead, she lives with her cat and child—a college graduate of the COVID class of 2020. She co-hosts the Tiny Victories podcast on the Maximum Fun Podcast Network, which Vulture called a “bright spot of light and laughter in 2020.”
Jessica Hecht is known to audiences as Susan Bunch on TV’s Friends and Gretchen Schwartz on Breaking Bad. Onstage, she was last seen in Admissions at Lincoln Center, which earned her an Obie Award. Her Broadway credits include The Price, A Fiddler on the Roof, The Last Night of Ballyhoo, After the Fall, Julius Caesar, Brighton Beach Memoirs, Broadway Bound, A View from the Bridge, which garnered her a Tony nomination, Harvey, and The Assembled Parties. She has starred in numerous off-Broadway plays and 11 seasons at The Williamstown Theatre Festival. Recent television credits include High Maintenance and Red Oaks.
Julia Sweeney is an actress and a comedian. She was born and raised in Spokane, WA. She was trained by The Groundlings in Los Angeles. This led her to being hired on Saturday Night Live, 1990 through 1994. At SNL, she became most known for her androgynous character, Pat. She made a movie about the character called It’s Pat: The Movie, which was released in 1996 to horrendous reviews and even worse revenue. However, she has received good reviews and attendance for her numerous autobiographical one-person comedic monologues. Her first, God Said Ha!, played on Broadway at the Lyceum Theater, the recording of which was nominated for a Grammy. Her third one-person show, Letting Go of God, was filmed and shown on Showtime in 2008. Sweeney wrote a memoir in 2015, If It’s Not One Thing, It’s Your Mother, published by Simon & Schuster. Her latest one-person show, Julia Sweeney: Older & Wider, will be filmed in Spokane in October 2021. Sweeney lives in Los Angeles, with her husband, Michael. Together, they have a grown daughter, Mulan. Currently, she recurs on three TV series: Shrill on Hulu, Work in Progress on Showtime, and American Gods on Starz/Amazon.
Marisa Tomei is an Academy Award-winning actress for her performance in My Cousin Vinny. She received two additional Academy Award nominations for In the Bedroom and The Wrestler. Additional film credits include What Women Want, Anger Management, Wild Hogs, The Ides of March, Parental Guidance, Untamed Heart, Only You, The Paper, Unhook the Stars, Slums of Beverly Hills, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, Cyrus, Love Is Strange, The Big Short, The First Purge, and The King of Staten Island. She also portrays May Parker in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, having appeared in Captain America: Civil War, Spider-Man: Homecoming, Avengers: Endgame, and Spider-Man: Far From Home. Tomei was formerly involved with the Naked Angels Theater Company and appeared in Daughters, Wait Until Dark, Top Girls, for which she received Drama Desk nomination, and The Realistic Joneses, for which she received a special honor at the Drama Desk Awards. Upcoming projects include Sarah Cooper: Everything's Fine, Sweet Girl, Delia's Gone, and the next installment of the Spider-Man franchise.
Charlayne Woodard is a two-time Obie Award winner for her work in In the Blood and The Witch of Edmonton. Her Broadway credits include Hair and Ain’t Misbehavin’, for which she was nominated for a Tony Award. Off-Broadway, her numerous performances include Fabulation, or the Re-Education of Undine; The Substance of Fire; WAR; Hamlet; and, most recently, Daddy, for which she was nominated for a Lucille Lortel Award. As a playwright, her award-winning plays include Pretty Fire, Neat, In Real Life, The Night Watcher, and Flight. Woodard has been featured on film and television in Eye for an Eye, The Crucible, Unbreakable, Sunshine State, Law and Order: Special Victims Unit, The Leftovers, The Blacklist, Glass, Bull, Bluff City Law, and currently, Sneaky Pete, Pose, and Prodigal Son. Woodard’s recent play, The Garden, a commission of the LaJolla Playhouse, has productions scheduled in 2021 at Baltimore Center Stage and The LaJolla Playhouse.
At the Thalia Book Club, readers and writers meet for intimate conversations about compelling new books and favorite classics in fiction, essays, memoirs, and more. Most evenings include an actor performing an excerpt, an interview, and a conversation with the audience.
Expected Run Time is 60 minutes
