OPENING NIGHT: Author Pam Houston, author Dorothy Rice, reader Caro Marks & reader Gay Cooper
January 31, 2020 - Opening Night Performance
Please join us Friday, January 31 for opening night of our 2020 season. Caro Marks will perform a story by acclaimed author, teacher and speaker, Pam Houston, and Gay Cooper will perform a story by our own co-director and memoirist, Dorothy Rice. We'll also raise a teary-eyed bon voyage toast to Casting Director Peggi Wood. Doors open at The Clara at 7:00 and the performance begins at 7:30. Please donate below through Eventbrite for your spot at this special event. Capital Books will sell copies of both memoirs. Sue Staats will bring her homemade cookies and Pushkin's Bakery will donate gluten-free delights.
February 1, 2020 - Writing Workshop (SOLD OUT)
Saturday, February 1, Houston will conduct a generative writing workshop. This workshop is SOLD OUT. Soon we will announce details for our March 28, 2020 writing workshop with New York Times bestselling author, Tod Goldberg.
Meet the Cast
Pam Houston
Houston’s story, "Eating Phoebe," is excerpted from her recent memoir, Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country. Houston is also the author of two novels, Contents May Have Shifted and Sight Hound, two collections of short stories, Cowboys Are My Weakness and Waltzing the Cat, and a collection of essays, A Little More About Me, all published by W.W. Norton.Her fiction has been selected for volumes of The O. Henry Awards, The Pushcart Prize, Best American Travel Writing, and Best American Short Stories of the Century, among other anthologies. She is the winner of the Western States Book Award, the WILLA Award for contemporary fiction, the Evil Companions Literary Award and several teaching awards.
In a recent L.A.Times review, Nathan Deuel writes of Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country, “…good writing can make you envious, no matter how foreign the terrain. Other times, you read a good memoir and find yourself wanting to track down the author and become friends. A third kind of book is so insightful and evocative, you shelve it beside other favorite and instructive titles. Deep Creek might just do all three.”
Houston will also lead our generative writing workshop on February 1, 2020, the Saturday morning following the performance of her story. This workshop is SOLD OUT.
Houston’s story, "Eating Phoebe," is excerpted from her recent memoir, Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country. Houston is also the author of two novels, Contents May Have Shifted and Sight Hound, two collections of short stories, Cowboys Are My Weakness and Waltzing the Cat, and a collection of essays, A Little More About Me, all published by W.W. Norton.Her fiction has been selected for volumes of The O. Henry Awards, The Pushcart Prize, Best American Travel Writing, and Best American Short Stories of the Century, among other anthologies. She is the winner of the Western States Book Award, the WILLA Award for contemporary fiction, the Evil Companions Literary Award and several teaching awards.
In a recent L.A.Times review, Nathan Deuel writes of Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country, “…good writing can make you envious, no matter how foreign the terrain. Other times, you read a good memoir and find yourself wanting to track down the author and become friends. A third kind of book is so insightful and evocative, you shelve it beside other favorite and instructive titles. Deep Creek might just do all three.”
Houston will also lead our generative writing workshop on February 1, 2020, the Saturday morning following the performance of her story. This workshop is SOLD OUT.
Caro Marks
Marks will perform Houston’s Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country. Marks is an attorney, writer and artist from San Francisco. She moved to Sacramento in 1992 to work for the Federal Defender for the Eastern District of California. As a trial attorney in state and federal court, she tried close to 65 jury trials before retiring in 2012. Then she decided to focus on the right side of her brain and converted a laundry room to an art studio. Her unconventional mosaics have appeared in fifteen group shows in Northern and Southern California, winning numerous prizes, including at the California State Fair. She is a published writer and a performer in the upcoming February 2020 Vagina Monologues at the Colonial Theater. Marks is also a Narrator for the California State Braille and Talking Book Library, where she narrates audiobooks for users unable to read standard print.
Marks will perform Houston’s Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country. Marks is an attorney, writer and artist from San Francisco. She moved to Sacramento in 1992 to work for the Federal Defender for the Eastern District of California. As a trial attorney in state and federal court, she tried close to 65 jury trials before retiring in 2012. Then she decided to focus on the right side of her brain and converted a laundry room to an art studio. Her unconventional mosaics have appeared in fifteen group shows in Northern and Southern California, winning numerous prizes, including at the California State Fair. She is a published writer and a performer in the upcoming February 2020 Vagina Monologues at the Colonial Theater. Marks is also a Narrator for the California State Braille and Talking Book Library, where she narrates audiobooks for users unable to read standard print.
Dorothy Rice
Rice's story, "New Year's Reckoning," is excerpted from her new book, Gray is the New Black: A Memoir of Self Acceptance. Evoking Nora Ephron’s wry I Feel Bad About My Neck and Roxane Gay's cathartic Hunger, Rice's memoir tells an intimate story of ageism, shame and affirmation, one that will resonate not only with women of a certain age, but also with anyone who's experienced a challenging relationship with their mother, food, their body, their hair, their past self or who they are right now.
Her first book, The Reluctant Artist, is an art book/memoir about her father, an immigrant from the Philippines, published by Shanti Arts in 2015. An essay about her mother’s descent into Alzheimer’s was awarded second place in the 2018 Kalanithi Awards (honoring Paul Kalanithi, author of When Breath Becomes Air), and one of her short stories was nominated for a Pushcart and Best of the Net. She has published essays and stories in a number of literary journals.
When Rice retired from a 35-year career in environmental protection with the California State Assembly and CalEPA, she earned an MFA in creative writing from UC Riverside, Palm Desert at the age of sixty. Rice also works for 916 Ink, leading creative writing workshops with area youth, and co-directs Stories on Stage Sacramento.
Rice's story, "New Year's Reckoning," is excerpted from her new book, Gray is the New Black: A Memoir of Self Acceptance. Evoking Nora Ephron’s wry I Feel Bad About My Neck and Roxane Gay's cathartic Hunger, Rice's memoir tells an intimate story of ageism, shame and affirmation, one that will resonate not only with women of a certain age, but also with anyone who's experienced a challenging relationship with their mother, food, their body, their hair, their past self or who they are right now.
Her first book, The Reluctant Artist, is an art book/memoir about her father, an immigrant from the Philippines, published by Shanti Arts in 2015. An essay about her mother’s descent into Alzheimer’s was awarded second place in the 2018 Kalanithi Awards (honoring Paul Kalanithi, author of When Breath Becomes Air), and one of her short stories was nominated for a Pushcart and Best of the Net. She has published essays and stories in a number of literary journals.
When Rice retired from a 35-year career in environmental protection with the California State Assembly and CalEPA, she earned an MFA in creative writing from UC Riverside, Palm Desert at the age of sixty. Rice also works for 916 Ink, leading creative writing workshops with area youth, and co-directs Stories on Stage Sacramento.
Gay Cooper
Cooper will perform Rice’s Gray is the New Black: A Memoir of Self-Acceptance. She has acted with many theater companies in town, including Resurrection Theater, Big Idea Theater, Kolt Run Creations, and California Stage. She has also worked in commercials and industrial films. She has participated in previous Chandra Prize winner celebrations and is a Stories on Stage favorite, reading for both the Sacramento and Davis series.
Cooper will perform Rice’s Gray is the New Black: A Memoir of Self-Acceptance. She has acted with many theater companies in town, including Resurrection Theater, Big Idea Theater, Kolt Run Creations, and California Stage. She has also worked in commercials and industrial films. She has participated in previous Chandra Prize winner celebrations and is a Stories on Stage favorite, reading for both the Sacramento and Davis series.
Stories on Stage Sacramento In the News
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Sue Staats: "Outgoing coordinator for Stories on Stage Sacramento - A new chapter"
Sacramento News & Review
10/24/2019 |
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