An Evening with David Sedaris at ArtPower

ArtPower at UC San Diego presents performing arts that engage, energize, and transform the diverse cultural life of the university and San Diego.

Through vibrant, challenging, multi-disciplinary performances, ArtPower seeks to develop more empathetic students and community members who are better prepared to engage in the world around them through their participation in highquality artistic, educational, and engagement programs that broaden thinking and awareness, deepen understanding, and encourage new dialogues across UC San Diego and the community.

OUR IMPACT • ArtPower brings artists from around the world into UC San Diego classrooms • ArtPower provides students with free artist master classes • ArtPower integrates artist-led discussions into on-campus curricula.

Special Event / USA

About the Artist

ArtPower presents

Humorist and Best-selling Author of Calypso and A Carnival of Snackery: Diaries (2003–2020)

May 7, 2022 at 8 pm Balboa Theatre

David Sedaris is one of America’s pre-eminent humor writers. He is a master of satire and one of today’s most observant writers.

David Sedaris

Beloved for his personal essays and short stories, David Sedaris is the author of Barrel Fever, Holidays on Ice, Naked, Me Talk Pretty One Day, Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim, When You Are Engulfed in Flames, Let’s Explore Diabetes with Owls, and Calypso, which was a Washington Post Best Book of the Year. He is the author of Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk: A Modest Bestiary, a collection of fables with illustrations

by Ian Falconer. He is also the author of an essay length ebook titled Themes and Variations. Each of these books was an immediate bestseller. He was also the editor of Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules: An Anthology of Outstanding Stories. His pieces regularly appear in the New Yorker and have twice been included in “The Best American Essays.” The first volume of his diaries Theft By Finding: Diaries (1977–2002) was a New York Times best-selling book. As a companion piece to the book, Jeffrey Jenkins published and edited an art book of Sedaris’s diary covers, entitled David Sedaris Diaries: A Visual Compendium. His book, The Best of Me, is a collection of 42 previously published stories and essays, about which novelist Andrew Sean Greer wrote in the New York Times: “You must read The Best of Me. It will be a new experience, knowing that enough time has passed to find humor in the hardest parts of life. More than ever—we’re allowed to laugh.” The second volume of his diaries, A Carnival of Snackery, Diaries (2003– 2020) (Little Brown/Hachette, October 5, 2021) was also a New York Times bestseller and the audiobook was selected as part of Apple’s Best Audiobooks of the Year for 2021. His next book will be Happy-Go-Lucky (Little, Brown, May 31,2022).

Cover: Photo by Anne Fishbein Special Event

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Sedaris and his sister, Amy Sedaris, have collaborated under the name “The Talent Family” and have written half-a-dozen plays which have been produced at La Mama, Lincoln Center, and The Drama Department in New York City. These plays include Stump the Host, Stitches, One Woman Shoe, which received an Obie Award, Incident at Cobbler’s Knob, and The Book of Liz, which was published in book form by Dramatists Play Service.

Sedaris has been nominated for five Grammy Awards for Best Spoken Word and Best Comedy Album. His audio recordings include “David Sedaris: Live for Your Listening Pleasure” and “David Sedaris Live at Carnegie Hall.” A feature film adaptation of his story C.O.G. was released after a premiere at the Sundance Film Festival (2013). Since 2011, he can be heard annually on a series of live recordings on BBC Radio 4 entitled “Meet David Sedaris.” In 2019 David Sedaris became a regular contributor to CBS Sunday Morning, and his Masterclass, David Sedaris Teaches Storytelling and Humor, was released.

There are over 16 million copies of his books in print and they have been translated into 32 languages. He has been awarded the Terry Southern Prize for Humor, Thurber Prize for American Humor, Jonathan Swift International Literature Prize for Satire and Humor, Time 2001 Humorist of the Year Award, as well as the Medal for Spoken Language from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In March 2019 he was elected as a member into the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In 2020 the New York Public Library voted Me Talk Pretty One Day one of the 125 most important books of the last 125 years.

You can follow David on Facebook at www.facebook.com/davidsedaris or visit his official website at http://www.davidsedarisbooks.com/ “Sedaris ain’t the preeminent humorist of his generation by accident” —Whitney Pastorek, Entertainment Weekly “Sedaris has hit upon the narrative equivalent of Pepsi, or the PlayStation, or oxygen, or the haircut: something that others in the world might actually want and find useful. . .

He’s smart, he’s caustic, he’s mordant, and, somehow, he’s . . . well, nice.”

—Bill Richardson, Toronto Globe and Mail “Sedaris’s droll assessment of the mundane and the eccentrics who inhabit the world’s crevices make him one of the greatest humorists writing today.”

—Chicago Tribune “Sedaris belongs on any list of people writing in English at the moment who are revising our ideas about what’s funny.”

—San Francisco Chronicle

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Program

ARTPOWER DONORS 2021–22 CATALYST ($20,000+)

Judith Bachner and Eric Lasley Bobbie and Jon Gilbert Joan and Irwin Jacobs Fund of the Jewish Community Foundation Patricia and Christopher Weil of The Weil Family Foundation

CREATOR ($10,000–19,999)

Bjorn Bjerede and Josephine Kiernan Phyllis and Daniel Epstein George Clement Perkins Endowment Marilyn and Charles Perrin

ADVOCATE ($2,500–9,999)

Joan J. Bernstein ArtPower Student Engagement Endowment Fund Maureen and C. Peter Brown Anne Marie Pleska and Luc Cayet In Memory of Jennifer A. Dennis Martha and Edward Dennis Ronald and Wynnona Goldman Hamburger Chamber Music Series Endowment Fund Jack Lampl Eva and Doug Richman Ruth S. Stern ArtPower Student Engagement Fund

GUARDIAN ($1,000–2,499)

Marilyn J. Colby Renita Greenberg and Jim Allison Edward and Arlene Pelavin Sharon Perkowski Robert and Lauren Resnik Edith and Paul Sanchez Kim Signoret-Paar Barbara and Sam Takahashi

CONTRIBUTOR ($500–999) Janice P. Alper Constance Beardsley Teresa and Sam Buss Janice and Nelson Byrne Natalee C. Ellars Turea Erwin Nora Jaffe Harry M. Mattheny Phyllis and Edward Mirsky Marilies Schoepflin

SPARK ($250–499)

Linda C. Allen K. Andrew Achterkirchen Mary L. Beebe Paulyne Becerra Jennifer and Barry Greenberg Barbara and Rodney Orth Carol Plantamura James and Kathleen Stiven

YORK SOCIETY

Donors who make provisions for ArtPower in their estate Joyce Axelrod and Joseph Fisch Judith Bachner and Eric Lasley Ruth Stern Kathryn Sturch

FOUNDATION/CORPORATE SPONSORS CORPORATE SPONSORS

The Parker Foundation National Performance Network New England Foundation for the Arts

ARTPOWER STAFF DONORS Carolena Deutsch-Garcia Jordan Peimer Kathryn Sturch

POWERPLAYERS

PowerPlayers are an exceptional group of donors that have made a three year commitment to support ArtPower.

Joyce Axelrod and Joseph Fisch Joan Bernstein Marilyn Colby Martha and Ed Dennis Phyllis and Daniel Epstein Elaine Galinson Bobbie and Jon Gilbert Renita Greenberg and Jim Alison Eric Lasley and Judith Bachner Sharon Perkowski Kim Signoret-Paar Paul and Edith H. Sanchez Pat Weil and Christopher Weil A portion of funding for ArtPower is provided by the UC San Diego Student Services Fee Committee.

Donor list and PowerPlayer list reflecting gifts and pledges allocated for February 1, 2021 through March 27, 2022.

Special Event

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ARTPOWER STAFF

Joanna Christian, Associate Director of Marketing & Communications Carolena Deutsch-Garcia, Associate Director of Development Jennifer Mancano, Events & Performing Arts Business Manager Jordan Peimer, Executive Director Kathryn Sturch, Production Manager

STUDENT STAFF

Ashley Asadi '23, Junior Arts Org Assistant Karen Avila '24, Usher Olivia Bryan '22, Senior Marketing & Graphic Design Assistant Valen Chang '22, Usher Cameron Chen '22, Junior Arts Org Assistant Caleb Foley '23, Usher Katrina Graziano '25, Usher Julie Han '22, Junior Arts Org Assistant Avery Hom '22, Senior Marketing & Graphic Design Assistant Issac Ing '24, Usher Mandy Lai '25, Junior Arts Org Assistant Kaitlin Lee '24, Usher Julie Li '25, Junior Arts Org Assistant Emmalias '24, Production Assistant Jocelyn Obregon-Padilla '23, Usher Ashley Moon '22, Junior Marketing & Graphic Design Assistant Calvin Naraghi '22, Production Assistant Tracy Nguyen '23, Junior Arts Org Assistant Rachel Paner '24, Junior Arts Org Assistant Sierra Plys '23, Usher Yeji Shin '22, Junior Marketing & Graphic Design Assistant Musa Turner '24, Usher Hasmineh Sinani '22, Production Assistant Hao Wang '24, Junior Arts Org Assistant Xiaoxuan (Andrina) Zhang '24, Usher

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Program