The late Laurie Colwin has hot tips about how to feed picky eaters in “Feeding the Fussy,” read by Tracee Chimo. In our second work, “Home Turf,” Indian novelist Kiran Desai remembers her childhood—and a temperamental chef. The story is performed by Angel Desai. In our final story, “Watkyn, Comma,” a mysterious presence haunts an old mill, creating a calamitous condition for a would-be baker starting a new life. The work is by classic children’s writer Joan Aiken and read by Sonia Manzano.
Guest host Hope Davis presents three works curated with the online food and cooking community Food52, which describes itself as “the first of its kind to support, connect, and celebrate cooks and home enthusiasts, giving them everything they need to eat thoughtfully and live joyfully.” Food52 co-creators Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs joined with Shorts to present an evening that celebrated all the ways food intersects with our lives.
First, the late Laurie Colwin has hot tips about how to feed picky eaters in “Feeding the Fussy.” Colwin wrote numerous works of fiction and non-fiction, including the novels Happy All the Time, Family Happiness, and A Big Storm Knocked It Over, and the short story collections Passion and Affect, The Lone Pilgrim, and Another Marvelous Thing. A frequent contributor to Gourmet, many of her articles for the magazine were published in her essay collections Home Cooking (from which “Feeding the Fussy" comes) and More Home Cooking. Colwin was also a contributor to The New Yorker, Mademoiselle, and Allure, among other publications.
Reader Tracee Chimoo earned the Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Lead Actress for her performance in “Bad Jews” at the Roundabout. Her theater credits include “Circle Mirror Transformation,” for which she won Obie and Drama Desk Awards, and she has been seen on Broadway in “Harvey,” “The Heidi Chronicles,” “Noises Off,” and “Irena's Vow.” On television, she's had recurring roles on “Orange Is the New Black,” and “Difficult People.” Additional television includes: “Black Box,” “The Money,” “Louie,” “Royal Pains,” “High Maintenance,” “The Good Wife,” and “Instinct.” Chimo’s film credits include “Black Hat,” “Concussion,” “Take Care,” “Side Effects,” “Sully,” and “Private Life.”
In our second work, “Home Turf,” Indian novelist Kiran Desai remembers her childhood—and a temperamental chef. Desai is the author of the novels Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard, winner of the Betty Trask Award, and The Inheritance of Loss, winner of the Man Booker Prize. She was awarded the Berlin Prize fellowship from the American Academy in Berlin in 2013, and was listed one of 20 Most Influential Global Indian Women by The Economic Times in 2015.
“Home Turf,” is performed by Angel Desai, whose theatre credits include “Company,” “Peer Gynt and the Norwegian Hapa Band,” “The Tempest,” “Manic Flight Reaction,” and “An Ordinary Muslim.” Desai’s television credits include “Jessica Jones,” “Chicago Med,” “Minority Report,” “Madam Secretary,” “Major Crimes,” and “Damages.”
In our final story, “Watkyn, Comma,” a mysterious presence haunts an old mill, creating a calamitous condition for a would-be baker starting a new life. The work is by classic children’s writer Joan Aiken (1924 - 2004). Aiken was awarded a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire for her contributions to children’s literature. Her novel The Whispering Mountain, part of the Wolves Chronicles series, won the prestigious Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize, and her novel Night Fall won the Edgar Allan Poe Award. In total, Aiken published more than one hundred works, including the Arabel and Mortimer series, transformative retellings of Jane Austen, and the posthumously released collection The People in the Castle: Selected Strange Stories.
“Watkyn, Comma,” is read by Sonia Manzano, known to millions as Maria on “Sesame Street,” a character she played from 1971 to 2015. Manzano also earned fifteen Emmy Awards as a writer for the show. Her theater credits include “The Exonerated;” “Love, Loss,” and “What I Wore;” and the original production of “Godspell.” She is the author of the picture books No Dogs Allowed!, A Box Full of Kittens, and Miracle on 133rd Street, as well as the middle-grade novel The Revolution of Evelyn Serrano and her memoir, Becoming Maria: Love and Chaos in the South Bronx. In 2016, Manzano received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 43rd Annual Daytime Emmy Awards.
