• By Don Dwiggins
  • Posted Thursday, July 25, 2013

Free Celebrity Reader's Series at the Library

In association with the National Black Theatre Festival and Forsyth County Public Library, SonEdna will present the Mid-Morning Matinee, a free celebrity reader’s series featuring the literary arts. SonEdna – a premiere literary organization based in Mississippi – invites festival patrons to a unique event blending literary arts and performance. The SonEdna Mid-Morning Matinee will offer three distinctive literary programs over three consecutive days.

The Mid-Morning Matinee kicks off with Family Story Hour, featuring the stellar celebrity duo, Sesame Street icon Roscoe Orman and Pauletta Pearson-Washington, Orman’s co-star in the National Black Theatre Festival drama Power Play by Lorey Hayes. Orman, best known for playing Gordon on Sesame Street and spokesperson for AudibleKids.com, will delight young audiences, reading aloud from his premiere children’s book, Ricky and Mobo, a modern fable about a boy and his horse. Pearson-Washington will follow with an interactive reading of Ellington is Not A Street by literary icon Ntozake Shange, author of the Broadway classic for colored girls who considered suicide when the rainbow is enuf. A delightful double bill for young and old, one and all. Wednesday, July 31, 11:00 am to 12:30 pm pm. Malloy/Jordan East Winston Heritage Center

NBTF Co-Chair Tonya Pinkins takes center stage to read from her straight, no-nonsense memoir, Get Over Yourself: How to Drop the Drama and Claim the Life You Deserve. The Tony Award-winning actress has been acclaimed on Broadway for her title role in Caroline, or Change; her starring role in Jelly’s Last Jam; for her long-term run on ABC’s All My Children and her frequent, featured television appearances. You’d never know that at one point she was a virtually homeless single mother, flat broke, and on welfare. But Pinkins resolved to fix the problems that seemed unfixable — and within four years she was back on top, and a millionaire. In this frank and inspiring book, Pinkins shows readers how to choose what they want from life, and how to achieve it. SonEdna Mid-Matinee patrons will get the rare treat of hearing these words of lived wisdom straight from the author’s mouth, up close and personal.Thursday, August 1st, 11:00 am to 12:30 pm. Malloy/Jordan East Winston Heritage Center.

SonEdna welcomes best-selling author and actress Victoria Rowell. Widely known for her role as street urchin-turned-fashion model Drucilla Barber on the long-running, top-rated serial The Young and the Restless, Rowell made a literay splash with her Essence Book Club pick, Secrets of a Soap Opera Diva. The over-the-top romp tell-all view of the backbiting world of daytime television was so successful, Rowell has written a juicy sequel, The Young and the Ruthless. Once again, the instantly likable leading lady Calysta Jeffries stirs up more drama than she can handle and Rowell is sure to offer a reading that will leave the audience on the edge of their seats. Rowell will also read from her remarkable memoir, The Women Who Raised Me, a moving personal account of a child who is thrust into the foster care system and rescued by a village of women. Reading selections from fiction and fact, Rowell offers mid-morning enchantment for soap opera, theatre and literature fans, alike. Friday, August 2nd, 11:00 am to 12:30 pm. Central Library Auditorium

Join us for a little coffee or tea and an up-close-and-personal conversation, celebrating the literary arts with a dynamic and dramatic new program. The SonEdna Mid-Morning Matinee is a perfect way to start your National Black Theatre Festival day.

Each SonEdna Mid- Morning Matinee reading will be followed by an intimate Q&A and a book signing. All of the events will be presented at Forsyth County Public Library sites in Winston-Salem and all are free to the public.

SonEdna was founded by Myrna Colley-Lee in 2006 to bring together writers from around the country, allowing them to interact with each other, the public, and students in a mutually beneficial symbiotic relationship. SonEdna believes that people empowered through the literary arts discern, decide, and design with greater authority, clarity, understanding, and compassion.

In 2011, SonEdna made its National Black Theatre Festival debut with the dramatic reading of Ifa Bayeza’s Charleston Olio, which was adapted from her novel, “Some Sing, Some Cry” and featured Phylicia Rashad and National Black Theatre Festival former Co-Chair Hattie Winston.

Other SonEdna programs include salons, student writing workshops, school presentations, peer critical review for emerging writers, retreats and residencies for established writers, literary showcases.

For more information please contact SonEdna Director Benjamen Douglas at 662.625.6178.

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