March 22, 2005
Best-selling humorist David Sedaris returns to Santa Barbara to read his hilarious work at the Arlington Theatre
Summary Facts:
- David Sedaris
- Author of bestsellers Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim and Me Talk Pretty One Day
- Acclaimed for his appearances on This American Life
- Monday, April 25
- 8 pm / Arlington Theatre, 1317 State Street
- General: $30 / UCSB students: $15
- Tickets/information: UCSB Arts & Lectures at 893-3535 or the Arlington Ticket Agency at 963-4408
David Sedaris, one of America’s wittiest and most irreverent voices, will read new work on Monday, April 25 at 8 pm at the Arlington Theatre, 1317 State Street, Santa Barbara. Sedaris’ most recent book Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim has topped numerous national bestseller lists and earned him raves. Publishers Weekly claimed, “Sedaris is Garrison Keillor’s evil twin: like the Minnesota humorist, Sedaris focuses on the icy patches that mar life’s sidewalk, though the ice in his work is much more slippery and the falls much more spectacularly funny.”
Unlike most writers, Sedaris came to prominence reading his work aloud. In 1992 his self-admittedly high-pitched nasal whine brought National Public Radio listeners “SantaLand Diaries,” his droll tale about working as an elf in New York’s Macy’s. Morning Edition received more mail about that essay than any piece it has ever aired. Offers from film and television came pouring in, but Sedaris continued to work as an apartment cleaner in New York by day, as he could—and still can—write only at night. In 1994 “SantaLand Diaries” ended up as the capstone piece in his first collection, the bestseller Barrel Fever.
A friendship with Ira Glass, host and creator of NPR’s This American Life, has led to Sedaris becoming a fixture on that show. As fellow This American Life star and author of The Partly Cloudy Patriot Sarah Vowell has said, “[Sedaris] can not only tell a story, but tell a story you’ve never heard.” His material often begins with his large and whacky family, from his Greek grandmother Ya Ya, who cooked meals in what appeared to be witches’ caldrons, to his sister Amy, who came home for Christmas one year wearing a fat suit just to annoy their body-conscious father. But each essay is centered by his own sardonic point-of-view; Sedaris almost always feels alienated and is more than willing to let the reader know precisely how alienated.
Since Barrel Fever Sedaris has released Holidays on Ice, a collection of Christmas related stories; Naked, which culminates in a visit to a nudist colony, although Sedaris admits he doesn’t like being naked in his own apartment; and Me Talk Pretty One Day, half of which is devoted to his time in France, where he struggles with both the language and mean-spirited French teachers. “Sedaris brings X-ray vision to this strip search of the human psyche, sparing no one—including himself,” enthuses Entertainment Weekly. “His work is characterized by a brazen candor, a heart of gold, and the sort of blithely sophisticated, loopy humor that might have resulted if Dorothy Parker and James Thurber had had a love child.”
His book Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim was published in June 2004, and an anthology of stories, Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules An Anthology of Outstanding Stories, edited by David Sedaris will be published in April 2005. In 2005, David Sedaris was nominated for two Grammy Awards for Best Spoken Word Album (Dress Your Family in Corduroy & Denim) and Best Comedy Album (David Sedaris: Live at Carnegie Hall).
Sedaris and his sister Amy (best known for her Comedy Central show Strangers with Candy) collaborate under the name The Talent Family and write plays produced at La Mama ETC and at Lincoln Center in New York City. These plays include The Book of Liz, a unusual comedy about a woman with an enchanted cheese-ball recipe who gets a job at a pilgrim theme restaurant thanks to a Ukrainian pal who speaks with a Cockney accent. Other Talent Family productions are Stump the Host, Stitches, Incident at Cobbler’s Knob and One Woman Shoe, which won an Obie Award.
In UCSB Arts & Lectures’ on-going effort to make events accessible to all who wish to enjoy them, this event will be signed. American Sign Language interpretation is made possible by the California Arts Council in collaboration with the National Arts and Disability Center and by the Santa Barbara Foundation’s Access Theatre Endowment Fund.
Courtesy of Borders Books, works by David Sedaris will be available for purchase and signing at the event.
David Sedaris is presented by UCSB Arts & Lectures and sponsored by the Santa Barbara Independent, KCLU Public Radio, the Daily Nexus, the Four Seasons Biltmore and Borders. Arts & Lectures has presented David Sedaris before in November 1998, October 2001 and April 2003. Tickets are $30 for the general public and $15 for UCSB students.
For tickets or more information,
call UCSB Arts & Lectures at (805) 893-3535 or
the Arlington Ticket Agency at (805) 963-4408.
Editor: For photos, please call
George Yatchisin at (805) 893-3494.