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On the Road Reading with Music
September 17, 2022 @ 3:00 pm - 5:15 pm EDT
$10 – $20
The event takes place at The Strand in the Rare Book Room, New York, and will be livestreamed via Youtube. If you buy a livestream ticket you will be able to watch this event live, or at any time after broadcast.
Produced in collaboration with HB Studio.
Directed by actor, writer, director and educator David Deblinger of HB Studio, this unique event is part of Jack Kerouac 100 at The Village Trip, a celebration of the acclaimed novelist and poet in Downtown Manhattan, where he wrote much of his greatest work and where he was living when his most celebrated novel was published.
“When I think of On the Road, I think of when my son was four or five and we’d walk the one long block to the supermarket… he’d drop to the ground and just become enthralled with the earth, insects, pebbles, twigs… Like there was this incredibly complex and beautiful world that he wanted to touch and play with for forty-five minutes at least, while us adults have no time or interest in it,” reflects David Deblinger. On the Road is relevant, still, because the words are fueled with a desire to connect and understand and honor each ‘precious and holy moment’ we have left.
“I’m excited to put together a group of powerhouse artists to voice some of those beautiful words, at the same place Kerouac hung out – The Strand – almost seventy years ago, and actually have his friend David Amram who was there playing music here now, playing once again.
“To gather together to celebrate this masterpiece...I can’t think of a better way to spend a Saturday afternoon.”
Expect to be thrilled and surprised by our readers, who will include two award-winning actresses, Mercedes Ruehl and Marsha Mason.
Directed by David Deblinger
With music by David Amram, Adam Amram, Rene Hart, Kevin Twigg
A diverse cast including Stephanie Berry, Kevin Corrigan, John Doman, Marsha Mason, Dael Orlandersmith, Mercedes Ruehl, Jose Rivera, and John Ventimiglia read excerpts from Jack Kerouac’s classic novel accompanied by a jazz quartet led by the legendary David Amram. In 1957, Amram and Kerouac brought jazz + poetry to New York City, playing at venues across the Village.
Kindly note: proof of vaccination and masks are required in the space.
Strand Book Store was born in 1927 on Fourth Avenue on what was then called “Book Row,” an area that covered six city blocks and housed forty-eight bookstores. Our founder Benjamin Bass was all of twenty-five years old when he began his modest used bookstore and sought to create a place where books would be loved, and book lovers could congregate. Ninety years and a move over to Broadway, the Strand is still run by the Bass Family and is home to four floors of over 2.5 million used, new, and rare books, a wide array of bookish gifts, and fun literary events held almost every night of the week. From the dollar carts outside to the Rare Book Room on the third floor, and cheeky graffiti-ing throughout the store courtesy of Steve “EPSO” Powers, the iconic store now stands testament a place for book lovers to explore.
A Greenwich Village Reading List supplied by Strand Book Store.