BookTalk: Video

After a delay of a couple weeks, I finally found the time to upload video from BookTalk featuring Alice McDermott, author of the National Book Award winning Charming Billy, & Blake Robison, Artistic Director of Round House Theatre, who staged the play version of the novel. This was our inaugural BookTalk event, and it received funding this year from the National Endowment for the Arts. Look for more BookTalks in the future. And don't forget, if you'd like to hear more of Alice McDermott, she was also featured on The Writer's Center's podcast. In an interview with Shannon O'Neill.

BookTalk in Pictures

Thank you to everyone who came out for BookTalk: A Community Reads with Alice McDermott & Blake Robison yesterday. We had a packed crowd for the event (as you can see from the pictures below). A special thank you to the folks at Round House Theatre, especially Blake Robison & Lance Tucker. Also, big thanks to the National Endowment for the Arts, from which The Writer's Center received funding this year (to help launch BookTalk). For those of you who haven't seen Charming Billy at Round House yet, there's still time! A whole new week of shows has been added, so it's now running until February 27. Visit www.roundhousetheatre.org to purchase your tickets.

Later this week I'll post some video for the event. For now, pictures will have to suffice.

Blake Robison, Artistic Director of Round House Theatre and adaptor of the stage version of Charming Billy.

A big crowd.

Alice McDermott discusses female narrators in literature.

Blake Robison & Alice McDermott discuss adapting the novel to the stage.











We had a great time at yesterday's event, and we hope to do it again next year. If you were there and wish to share your thoughts on the event, please do so in the comments section of this blog. And those of you who still haven't gotten enough of Charming Billy or Alice McDermott, don't forget The Writer's Center podcast, which this month features her discussing the book.

BookTalk, Synapse Theatre This Weekend at TWC

A BIG thank you to Synapse Theatre for graciously allowing us to move our BookTalk event on Sunday--with Alice McDermott & Round House Theatre's Blake Robison--into our theatre. Synapse, who'd rented the space, will now have their performance start at 2:30 on this one day only. To learn more about this play, read below. The play is directed by Kathe Park and written by a rising star in UK theatre: Graham Farrow. As an added bonus, Farrow will be leading a workshop at TWC on playwriting called "Fundamentals of Playwriting."


Theatre Performances at The Writer’s Center
Synapse Theatre's Mid-Atlantic Premiere of:
Talk About the Passion
Play by Graham Farrow
Directed by Kathe Park

If your only child, a six year old boy is brutally murdered and the killer produces a best selling autobiography, how do you react? If the public turns on you and blames you because you let go of his hand at the crucial moment, what does that do to you? How do you behave when you confront the killers editor who has made a fortune and a name from your misery? Starring Angel Brown and Craig Miller
Starring Angel Brown and Craig Miller
Performance Dates & Times:

February 11, 12, 13, 18, 19, 20, 25, 26, and 27
Friday and Saturdays @ 7:30 and Sundays @ 2:00pm

Ticket prices are $20.00 for adults/$15.00 for students, seniors, military, and Actors Center members with ID. Groups of 10 or more: $10 per person, children 12 years or under: $7.50 per child, persons with disabilities: $12.50 per person.

For more information, visit the Synapse Web site: Synapse Theatre.

Sunday, 1:00 P.M. to 2:00 P.M. at The Writer's Center
BookTalk: A Community Reads (A FREE event)

The Writer’s Center will host a discussion about Charming Billy, Alice McDermott’s National Book Award-winning novel. At the event, McDermott will join Round House Theatre’s producing Artistic Director, Blake Robison (who wrote and directed RHT’s world premiere version of the play). The event is part of BookTalk: A Community Reads. A new program at The Writer’s Center—one for which The Writer’s Center received funding from the National Endowment for the Arts—BookTalk brings readers and writers together in conversation on a single book, much like a reading group. McDermott and Robison will discuss their involvement with the book and field questions from the audience.

Charming Billy at Round House Theatre

After the BookTalk event on February 20th, attend the play at Round House, followed by a panel discussion on adaptation. The World Premiere of Charming Billy will run at Round House from February 2-20, just a few blocks from TWC. These are ticketed shows. To purchase your tickets, visit their Web site.


TWC podcast with Alice McDermott

Our inaugural podcast is up! Click here to listen as Alice McDermott reads from her novel, Charming Billy, a National Book Award winner, and Shannon O'Neill discusses the novel with her.

Round House's "Charming Billy"

All this month--and with a whole week of shows added recently--Round House Theatre is putting on its production of "Charming Billy."

Zach and I made it down to the show on Monday. Gotta say: love it. For those of you who're familiar with the book, Blake Robison, RHT's Artistic Director and the play's adaptor, does a great job of putting it onto the stage. Of particular note, for me at least, was how the "narrator" of the book is presented on the stage. This isn't actually going to be a review of the play because, unfortunately, I wasn't able to take notes (no pen). BUT, I will say it's well worth a trip to RHT. Instead, take a look at The Gazette's description of the show in this week's issue. Or the Post preview here.

The only thing I'll add is that there is no intermission to the show, so plan accordingly!

If you see the play, don't forget that on February 20, TWC is hosting Alice McDermott & Blake Robison at the Center as part of our BookTalk: A Community Reads event, which rec'd funding this year from the National Endowment for the Arts.

And then, of course, we have our first ever podcast, this time featuring workshop leader and literary agent Shannon O'Neill (whose How2 Find a Literary Agent workshop you can find here) interviewing who else but Alice McDermott.

The Writer's Center's Podcast

I've been at the AWP conference most of this week, and wasn't able to post today's post until now (5:29 est). I'm here at the Center waiting for tonight's Maxine Hong Kingston event. I'll post a review and brief video clip of that reading on Monday. In the meantime, here is a pleasure for your ears: The Writer's Center's inaugural podcast. It features Alice McDermott and Shannon O'Neill discussing McDermott's novel Charming Billy, which is of course the subject of this month's BookTalk event on February 20. Have a listen!

BookTalk: A Community Reads Charming Billy

Those of you who are members of The Writer's Center or who've read our most recent Workshop & Event Guide know that local author Alice McDermott’s National Book Award-winning novel Charming Billy (1998) is the first selection for BookTalk: A Community Reads. A new program at The Writer’s Center—one for which we've received funding from the National Endowment for the Arts—BookTalk brings readers and writers together in conversation on a single book. Our hope is that by reading a single book we'll be able to enjoy the experience of a book club--including breaking down how the book was written. How can you participate in BookTalk?

How you can participate in BookTalk:

• Go to Writer.org and “join” the BookTalk discussion forum (it’s like signing up for a workshop, except it’s free). The Writer's Center's Kyle Semmel will moderate the discussion. But it's not a workshop per se: It's a discussion. That means it'll be an open forum for the discussion of ideas about the book. Themes. Characterization. Structure. All topics are open for discussion. Register for the discussion here.

• At the time of registration, purchase the book using your 30% off twc member discount (or for those of you who use electronic readers, download the book at your site of choice).

• Beginning the first week of February, Kyle will post questions about the book online and at our Facebook fan page and our Twitter feed.

• Listen to TWC’s Charming Billy podcast in February. That show will feature Alice McDermott in conversation with literary agent and workshop leader Shannon O'Neill.

• Meet the author and her “stage adapter,” Round House Theatre's Artistic Director Blake Robison, at The Writer’s Center on February 20 for the culminating BookTalk event beginning on February 20. You can register for this free event here.

In addition, you can attend the stage adaptation of Charming Billy at Round House Theatre all through February. (BUT PLEASE NOTE: In order to attend the stage version of the Round House play you will have to purchase tickets at Round House's Web site. There is no discount for TWC members or BookTalk participants. The stage production runs from February 2-20.) On February 20, you can join the post-play panel discussion of Charming Billy at Round House Theatre.*

About Charming Billy:
Alice McDermott’s 1998 National Book Award-winning novel portrays the tragic life of Billy Lynch, an Irish American who comes of age in New York City during the latter part of the twentieth century. It opens at his funeral where several of his friends and relatives gather to recall Billy’s life within his tight-knit Irish Catholic, Queens community. As they come to offer support to his long-suffering widow Maeve, they celebrate his poetic, gentle soul and mourn his descent into the alcoholism that eventually killed him.

Alice McDermott was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1953. Her first novel, A Bigamists’ Daughter, was published to wide acclaim in 1982. That Night (1987), her second novel, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, and for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. In his cover review for The New York Times Book Review, David Leavitt called That Night “an original, a work that revels in a rich, discursive prose style that belongs entirely to Alice McDermott.” A film version of That Night was produced by Warner Bros. and released in the spring of 1992. At Weddings and Wakes (1992), her third novel, became a New York Times bestseller. Michiko Kakutani of The New York Times praised McDermott’s “rich, supple prose” and Bruce Bawer called At Weddings and Wakes “a haunting and masterly work of literary art” in his review for The Wall Street Journal. ¶

* Tickets for the performance of Charming Billy must be purchased through the Round House Theatre box office at 240-644-1100 or roundhousetheatre.org.