The Project was read on stage by television, stage, and screen actor Michael Shannon. Her work has been featured in The Missouri Review and The Sun. She is a professor of Creative Writing at Dickinson College and on the faculty of Queens University. Perabo is the author of several pieces of renowned literature, such as Who I was Supposed to Be, and the novel The Broken Places.

Perabo’s The Project was read during the 2 hours. The 7-9 pm time slot featured stories by imaginative writers such as Susan Perabo, Patrick Dacey, and Victor LaValle, among others.

It makes you wonder what goes on all day at home while you’re away. The program kicked off with The Scaffolding Man by Jenny Allen, which was such an NYC love story and appropriate since the exiting lover was a writer, and the new love interest was the man outside the window hanging on scaffolding. The short stories are read without theatrical flourishes, personal and intimate, just like a bedtime story. The familiar rug, flowers, and the microphone at the podium adorn an otherwise bare stage. The latest, Saturday, March 26, 2022, is Wall to Wall Selected Shorts – 35 new commissions performed for 12 hours straight. The first marathon was an entire day of Bach Wall to Wall. His simple premise is to broadcast actors reading short stories. Sheffer’s programming remains true to his vision with Wall to Wall Selected Shorts.

In 1978, Sheffer founded Selected Shorts and was behind the move to transform the adjacent skating rink at the Thalia Theater (on the corner of 95 th and Broadway) into what is now Symphony Space. The ambitious overachiever Isaiah Sheffer once again pulls out a marathon event at his love child Symphony Space. After years of listening to the radio casts, it was heaven to put a face with the readings and finally experience what only live theater can do.Ĭlick HERE for more Off Broadway reviews. I was lucky enough to see Selected Shorts on the road at Austin and in their original location at Symphony Space when I moved back to NYC. The broadcasts began in 1985 and, once available on CDs, are now podcasts. Simple pleasures, a simple concept, and still going gangbusters, Selected Shorts has become iconic. Often authors are so compelling that you buy their books, orchestrate a picnic, and read the stories out loud to one another and fall in love… You were lucky to be invited over to hear the broadcast with a person of interest and afterward discuss the theme and the selections. The founder, Isaiah Sheffer, may not have known he left a legacy of cheap dates. That is what comes to mind whenever I hear the term Selected Shorts at Symphony Space. After 7 Minutes at the Here theater, we segue into the marvelous Selected Shorts.ĭate night. New York is alive with theater this spring.

Symphony space selected shorts