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When Spalding Gray succumbed to depression and took his life in the winter of 2004, he left behind a loving family, a legion of devoted fans and an enormous body of work.
Leftover Stories To Tell draws on Spalding's life and unique work, featuring excerpts from his hilarious monologues along with journal entries, poems, and other unpublished – and previously unperformed – writing. The project, organized and directed by his widow Kathleen Russo and Lucy Sexton, is a daring tribute to the talented and always challenging Mr. Gray.
While Spalding himself became an indelible image – alone at a desk on a bare stage spinning his brilliant monologues, his performances were ultimately successful because the words resonated so deeply with the audience. Spalding's stories summed up a lot of our own fears and neuroses and helped us understand them or at least bear them a little better by allowing us intermittently to laugh at them. Seeing Spalding's words read by a stellar cast of his colleagues, friends, and admirers brings those stories to life in new and unexpected ways; pointing up the power of the writing and universal themes at the core of his work.
Kathleen Russo is co-founder of Washington Square Arts. In 1995, she was executive producer on the film Gray's Anatomy, directed by Steven Soderbergh and will co-produce with Josh Blum and Amy Hobby a documentary about Spalding Gray for HDNET directed by Mr. Soderbergh. She has three children Marissa, Forrest and Theo.
Lucy Sexton has worked in theatre in different capacities for more than 20 years. Co-creator of the dance-performance group, DANCENOISE, Ms. Sexton also produced Charles Atlas documentary The Legend of Leigh Bowery and can be seen currently in the randomly occurring live talk show, The Lucy Show, with co-host Mike Iveson.
www.storieslefttotell.com
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