Tag: Memoir

In conversation with Tim Curry (virtual event)

Join us for a virtual Live Talks Los Angeles event:
Monday, November 3, 2025, 6pm PT/9pm ET
 

**An Afternoon with Tim Curry
discussing his memoir, “Vagabond.”**

This event is taped with an audience on October 26.
VIRTUAL EVENT TICKETS (**US Orders Only**)
Monday, November 3, 2025, 6pm PT/9pm ET
$55 Virtual Admission + book with signed book plate (**includes shipping to US addresses only**). Includes access to watch the event on November 3 at 6pm PT/9pm ET and on video-on-demand for five days..

***With the upcoming 50th anniversary of The Rocky Horror Picture Show and the 40th anniversary of Clue, there’s never been a better time for Tim to share his story with the world. Tim’s memoir, Vagabond, is a celebration of his life’s work, and a testament to his profound impact on the entertainment industry.***

**Tim Curry **is an Emmy award-winning actor who’s worked in the entertainment industry for close to five decades. He is best known for his iconic roles in *The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Clue, It, The Pirates of Penzance, Spamalot, Hair, Home Alone 2, Muppet Treasure Island*, and countless others. 

There are few stars in Hollywood today who can boast the resume Emmy that award-winning actor Tim Curry has built over the past five decades. From his breakout role as Dr. Frank-N-Furter in *The Rocky Horror Picture Show* to his critically acclaimed role as the original King Aurthur in both the Broadway and West End versions of *Spamalot*, Curry redefined what it meant to be a character actor as he portrayed heroes and villains alike with complexity, nuance, and a genuine understanding of human darkness. 
.
In his rip-roaring memoir, *Vagabond*, Curry takes readers through his early beginnings as a military brat with difficult family dynamics, to his formative school years, to the moment when he hit the stage for the first time. He shares what it was like to work on some of the most best-known works of the 20th century. He also explores the voicework that has defined his career more recently, which provided him with a chance to pivot after surviving a catastrophic and nearly fatal stroke over a dozen years ago.

In conversation with Werner Herzog (virtual event)

Join us for a virtual Live Talks Los Angeles event:
Tuesday, October 21, 2025, 6pm PT/9pm ET

**An Evening with Werner Herzog
discussing his book, “The Future of Truth.”**

This event is taped with an audience on Oct 14.

VIRTUAL EVENT TICKETS (**US Orders Only**)
Tuesday, October 21, 6pm PT/9pm ET
$46 Virtual Admission + signed book (**includes shipping to US addresses only**). Includes access to watch the event on October 21 at 6pm PT/9pm ET and on video-on-demand for five days..

**From legendary filmmaker and author Werner Herzog, a compact, effervescent, and deeply personal exploration of art, philosophy, and history that unravels one of our most elusive and contested questions: What is truth—and how to find it in our “post-truth” era?**

**Werner Herzog** was born in Munich on September 5, 1942. He made his first film in 1961 at the age of nineteen. Since then, he has produced, written, and directed more than seventy feature and documentary films, including Aguirre, the Wrath of God; Nosferatu the Vampyre; Fitzcarraldo; Little Dieter Needs to Fly; My Best Fiend; Grizzly Man; Encounters at the End of the World; and Cave of Forgotten Dreams. Herzog has published more than a dozen books of prose and directed as many operas. 

For over half a century, Werner Herzog has challenged, enriched, and expanded our understanding of the truth. His films and books have mixed fiction and nonfiction, documentary and drama, reality and imagination. Invariably, Herzog goes beyond the appearance of what is true in search of a higher truth, or what he has often referred to as the “ecstatic truth.” In The Future of Truth, a great artist essays an answer to one of humanity’s deepest, most eternal questions. At a moment when deepfake AI videos are proliferating, and most people have simply thrown up their hands in despair at the ubiquity of what we now know as fake news—not to mention the constant lying and propagandizing from certain public figures—Herzog seeks a remedy. Mixing memoir, history, politics, poetry, science, and fierce opinion, he writes with dazzling originality and panache, urging readers to be unflagging and imaginative in the pursuit of truth, endless though the quest may be:

“I don’t think truth is some kind of polestar in the sky that we will one day get to. It’s more like an incessant striving. A movement, an uncertain journey, a seeking full of futile endeavor. But it is this journey into the unknown, into a vast twilit forest, that gives our lives meaning and purpose; it is what distinguishes us from the beasts in the fields.”

Debbie Gibson in conversation with Wil Wheaton (virtual event)

September 18 @ 6:00 pm

Join us for a virtual Live Talks Los Angeles event: Thursday, September 18, 2025, 6pm PT/9pm ET   **Debbie Gibson in conversation with Wil Wheaton discussing her memoir, “Eternally Electric: The Message in My Music”** *This event is taped with an audience on Sep 11.* VIRTUAL EVENT TICKETS (**US Orders Only**) TICKETS ON SALE JULY 31, 9am PT Thursday, September 18, 6pm PT/9pm ET $48 Virtual Admission + book with signed book plate **(includes shipping to US addresses only**). Includes access to watch the event on September 18 at 6pm PT/9pm ET and on video-on-demand for five days.. ***Debbie Gibson reflects on the lessons she learned in her years as a young pop pioneer and on her hard-earned journey to embrace her authentic self, allowing her to lead the healthy, engaged—and electric!—life she does today.*** **Debbie Gibson** is an award-winning singer-songwriter and Broadway actress with over sixteen million album sales worldwide and eleven US Top 40 singles. Now releasing new music through her own Stargirl Records label, she has also starred in several independent and TV movies, some of which she’s created and executive produced. A philanthropist involved in numerous charitable endeavors, Debbie wrote this memoir while touring to celebrate the thirty-fifth anniversary of her multi-platinum Electric Youth album and Lost in Your Eyes single simultaneously hitting #1 on the Billboard charts. Visit her website. **Will Wheaton** is a producer, narrator, and actor who has appeared in dozens of films and TV series, with recurring roles on TNT’s Leverage, SyFy’s Eureka, and the hit webseries The Guild. He is the creator, producer, and host of the webseries Tabletop, credited with reigniting national interest in tabletop gaming. He played a fictionalized version of himself on CBS’s The Big Bang Theory. He hosted nearly 200 episodes of The Ready Room, the official online hub for all things Star Trek universe. An accomplished voice actor, Wil has lent his talents to animated series including Family Guy, Teen Titans, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Batman: The Brave and the Bold. His audiobook narration of Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One debuted at number one on the New York Times bestseller list. He has also lent his voice to titles by John Scalzi, Randall Monroe, Andy Weir, and Joe Hill. In March of 2025, he launched a speculative fiction podcast called It’s Storytime with Wil Wheaton. He is the author of Just A Geek, Dancing Barefoot, The Happiest Days of Our Lives, Hunter, and Dead Trees Give No Shelter. Debbie Gibson was just sixteen when she released her multi-platinum debut album Out of the Blue and recorded “Foolish Beat” in 1988, making her the youngest person to ever write, produce, and perform a Billboard Hot 100 chart-topper. A child actress who became the original pop princess, Debbie had full creative control over her music and, when that no longer aligned with a transitioning arts scene, she went on to star in Broadway’s Les Misérables, Beauty and the Beast, and Cabaret, as well as in the London production of Grease.  Yet, for all the accolades and achievements, her success came at a high price. Anxiety, depression, financial struggles, illness—Debbie writes candidly about these and other challenges, and how she ultimately redesigned her life to overcome them. This is the story of her not only surviving, but thriving: returning to her musical roots, releasing new albums, going back out on tour, and living the best version of her authentic self to remain…Eternally Electric!

Details

Related Events

Emma Heming Willis in conversation with Maria Shriver (virtual event)

Join us for a virtual Live Talks Los Angeles event:
Monday, September 22, 2025, 6pm PT/9pm ET
 
**Emma Deming Willis in conversation with Maria Shriver
discussing her book, “The Unexpected Journey: Finding Strength, Hope, and Yourself on the Caregiving Path.”**

This event is taped with an audience on September 15.

VIRTUAL EVENT TICKETS (**US Orders Only**)
Monday, September 22, 6pm PT/9pm ET
$48 Virtual Admission + Emma Heming Willis signed book (**includes shipping to US addresses only**). Includes access to watch the event on September 22 at 6pm PT/9pm ET and on video-on-demand for five days..

***From Emma Heming Willis, wife of Bruce Willis, a deeply personal and richly compassionate supportive guide that helps caregivers care for themselves while they navigate a loved one’s dementia.***

**Emma Heming Willis** is a mother, step-mother, wife, advocate, and co-founder of Make Time Wellness, a brand devoted to women’s brain health. After her husband, Bruce Willis, was diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia, she became a passionate voice for care partners and families navigating neurodegenerative disease. Through her storytelling and advocacy, Emma hopes to help others feel less alone on the caregiving journey. 

**Maria Shriver** is a mother and grandmother, a Peabody and Emmy Award-winning journalist and producer. She is the author of eight *New York Times* bestselling books, the former First Lady of California, an NBC News Special Anchor, founder of Shriver Media, The Women’s Alzheimer’s Movement, co-founder of the brain health brand MOSH, and the publisher of The Open Field. She appeared on the Live Talks Los Angeles stage for her most recent book* I Am Maria: My Reflections and Poems on Heartbreak, Healing, and Finding Your Way Home.*

“Watching the journey our stepmom has bravely embarked on has been life-changing. Not only has she deeply educated and immersed herself in the world of caregiving, she has taken on this unexpected life change with poise and elegance. Emma’s fierce devotion, endless compassion, and relentless quest to learn has been nothing short of extraordinary. Her care for our daddio is tender and unwavering, and the vulnerability she shares with the world is a lifeline for so many others walking a similar path. We are endlessly proud of her and profoundly grateful to be her family.” —Rumer, Scout, and Tallulah Willis

“With grace, honesty, and unflinching courage, Emma has opened her heart to share the truth of caregiving—its heartbreaks and its hidden gifts. The Unexpected Journey is a lifeline for anyone navigating the complex world of dementia and it is her gift to every caregiver who has felt lost, overwhelmed, or alone. Through her story, Emma offers not only guidance, but also the kind of empathy that only comes from living it.” —Demi Moore
.
The day the actor Bruce Willis was diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia, his wife was given a pamphlet and told to check back in in a few months. With no hope or direction, Emma Heming Willis walked out of that doctor’s appointment frozen with fear, confusion and a sense that her world had just fallen apart.

How would she care for her husband while parenting their young daughters?

Now, she’s written the book she wishes she’d been given that day. The Unexpected Journey is her guide to navigating the complicated, heartbreaking, and transformative experience of caregiving for your loved one. In it, Willis weaves her personal journey as a care partner with the latest research and insights from the world’s top dementia, caregiving, and integrative experts she offers the guidance and wisdom caregivers need to hear.

WeHo Reads Returns for an Inspiring Fall 2022 Season

Posted onAuthorcodysisco

We’re back! After a summer hiatus, BookSwell returns with three events on the ROAD TO JOY!

9/20 WeHo Reads: Expansive Vistas and Hidden Corners

The next WeHo Reads event is Expansive Vistas and Hidden Corners on Tuesday, September 20, 2022, at 6 p.m. Artists and writers explore concepts of places, how they’re made, and how we understand, remember, and memorialize them.

Lynell George is a journalist and essayist based in Los Angeles, who tells the city’s story one sentence at a time. Her book, After/Image: Los Angeles Outside the Frame (Angel City Press 2018), is an exploration of the city in text and photography, and she explores the extraordinary creative life of Octavia E. Butler in A Handful of Earth, A Handful of Sky, published by Angel City Press in 2020. She will be in discussion with Marisela Norte, an American writer, poet, and artist living in Los Angeles and known for poetry that explores the unseen city, including her poetry collection Peeping Tom Tom Girl (Sunbelt Publications 2008). Together, they will explore hidden corners of Los Angeles and the poetry of the city in images and text.

RSVP to Attend via Zoom

10/5 WeHo Reads: Poets Laureate Across America

There will also be a special October 2022 event featuring a selection of poets from the Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellowship Program. These poets laureate were all chosen by the Academy to receive a $50,000 award to help support creative work and community engagement projects, and several of them will gather to share about the projects they created.

WeHo Reads: Poets Laureate Across America takes place on Wednesday, October 5, 2022, at 6 p.m.  In 2020, the Academy of American Poets awarded more than $1 million to 23 poets laureate as part of a year-long Fellowship to support their creative and organizing work. One of these awards went to City of West Hollywood City Poet Laureate Brian Sonia-Wallace who also serves as this event’s host. This reading brings together a group of these Fellows from across the country in the aftermath of their Fellowships to share what they did, read their writing, and reflect on the state of poetry across the United States.

RSVP to Attend via Zoom

11/15 WeHo Reads: Light in Our Hearts

Light in Our Hearts concludes the 2022 WeHo Reads season on Tuesday, November 15, 2022, at 6 p.m. 

The culminating event in the series will bring together poets, writers, and artists who live and create at the intersection of joy and hope and reckoning with pain. bridgette bianca is a poet and educator from South Central Los Angeles. Her debut book of poetry, be/trouble, is a powerful love letter to oft-overlooked Los Angeles, one that offers as much danger as it does glamour and as much grit as beauty. traci kato-kiriyama is a multi-disciplinary artist, writer/author, actor, arts educator & community organizer. Her recently published book from Writ Large Press, Navigating With(out) Instruments, is a collection of poetics, micro essays, and notes to self (and other)—a journey of several years, navigating through death moments, past/present tensions of war and violence, trauma and ideation, excavation, and memory. Cassandra Lane is a writer and editor based in Los Angeles. Her first book, WE ARE BRIDGES: A Memoir, weaves personal and historical geographies, lineages, upbringings, and upheavals into a complete tapestry, validating her glorious existence as a Black mother. There will also be closing remarks from series opener Shonda Buchanan.

RSVP to Attend via Zoom