Event Program
THALIA BOOK CLUB (12/14/21)
COLSON WHITEHEAD, HARLEM SHUFFLE
TUE, DECEMBER 14
READING
Calvin Leon Smith
DISCUSSION
Colson Whitehead and ZZ Packer
A CONVERSATION WITH THE AUDIENCE
Join the conversation! Text your questions for Colson Whitehead to (304) 715-2537.
The Artists
Colson Whitehead
Colson Whitehead is the number one New York Times bestselling author of ten books of fiction and non-fiction, including The Underground Railroad, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award and was named one of the Ten Best Books of the Year by The New York Times Book Review. He is also a recipient of the MacArthur and Guggenheim Fellowships. In 2020, he won his second Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for The Nickel Boys and was recently honored with the Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction. His latest novel, Harlem Shuffle, was published in September.
Colson Whitehead is the number one New York Times bestselling author of ten books of fiction and non-fiction, including The Underground Railroad, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award and was named one of the Ten Best Books of the Year by The New York Times Book Review. He is also a recipient of the MacArthur and Guggenheim Fellowships. In 2020, he won his second Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for The Nickel Boys and was recently honored with the Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction. His latest novel, Harlem Shuffle, was published in September.
ZZ Packer
ZZ Packer is an author whose stories have appeared in The New Yorker, Harper's, Story, and have been published in The Best American Short Stories and read on Symphony Space’s Selected Shorts. Packer is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Whiting Writers' Award, and a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers' Award. A graduate of Yale, the Iowa Writers' Workshop, and the Writing Seminar at Johns Hopkins University, she has been a Wallace Stegner-Truman Capote fellow and a Jones lecturer at Stanford University. Packer is the author of the bestselling collection Drinking Coffee Elsewhere.
ZZ Packer is an author whose stories have appeared in The New Yorker, Harper's, Story, and have been published in The Best American Short Stories and read on Symphony Space’s Selected Shorts. Packer is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Whiting Writers' Award, and a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers' Award. A graduate of Yale, the Iowa Writers' Workshop, and the Writing Seminar at Johns Hopkins University, she has been a Wallace Stegner-Truman Capote fellow and a Jones lecturer at Stanford University. Packer is the author of the bestselling collection Drinking Coffee Elsewhere.
Calvin Leon Smith
Calvin Leon Smith can be seen in the role of Jasper in Amazon’s The Underground Railroad, a recurring guest star on Season 3 of HBO's The Deuce, and was featured on HBO's High Maintenance in its final season. His theater credits include work at The Public Theater, Long Wharf Theatre, Clarence Brown Theatre, Actors Theatre of Louisville, La Jolla Playhouse, and Shakespeare on the Sound. Smith is a graduate of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, the British American Drama Academy, and a 2018 graduate of The Juilliard School, where he received his MFA in Acting.
Calvin Leon Smith can be seen in the role of Jasper in Amazon’s The Underground Railroad, a recurring guest star on Season 3 of HBO's The Deuce, and was featured on HBO's High Maintenance in its final season. His theater credits include work at The Public Theater, Long Wharf Theatre, Clarence Brown Theatre, Actors Theatre of Louisville, La Jolla Playhouse, and Shakespeare on the Sound. Smith is a graduate of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, the British American Drama Academy, and a 2018 graduate of The Juilliard School, where he received his MFA in Acting.
More Information
The Thalia Book Club is made possible thanks to the generous support of Susan Bay Nimoy, the NYC COVID-19 Response and Impact Fund in The New York Community Trust, the Howard Gilman Foundation, The Shubert Foundation, the Charina Endowment Fund, the Blanchette Hooker Rockefeller Fund, The Achelis and Bodman Foundation, the Consolidated Edison Company of New York, the Michael Tuch Foundation, the Vidda Foundation, the Lemberg Foundation, and The Grodzins Fund. This program is also made possible with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature. Symphony Space thanks our generous supporters, including our Board of Directors, Producers Circle, and members, who make our programs possible with their annual support.
It’s a truly extraordinary moment to be here for the 21/22 Symphony Space season! We are so grateful to the independent venue operators who banded together to initiate the Save Our Stages campaign, which became the Shuttered Venue Operators Grant. Through the leadership of Senator Chuck Schumer, and with bipartisan support from many Senators and Representatives, the creative community was bolstered by this special funding. All of us at Symphony Space extend our heartfelt thanks to each and every individual who recognized the unmistakable power and importance of the arts in this most critical moment.
Kathy Landau Executive Director
Peg Wreen Managing Director
Isaiah Sheffer*
Co-Founder and Co-Artistic Director (1978-1988)
Artistic Director (1988-2010)
Founding Artistic Director (2010-2012)
Allan Miller
Co-Founder and Co-Artistic Director (1978-1988)
Jennifer Brennan Director of Literary Programs
Drew Richardson Lead Producer of Literary Programs
Vivienne Woodward Producer of Literary Programs
Mary Shimkin Director of Broadcast & Literary Initiatives
Matthew Love Consultant for Literary Programs
Magdalene Wrobleski Literary Assistant
Antonio Brown Intern
Mollie Gordon Intern
*in memoriam