Thursday, Nov. 17, 2011 8pm (Reception 6:30-7:30pm)
Track 16 at Bergamot Station
2525 Michigan Avenue, Bldg C-1
Santa Monica, CA 90404

KCET members receive a 15% discount on tickets. Be sure to use this code at check out: KCET-MEM1. Get tickets.

Darrell Hammond's upcoming memoir, God, If You're Not Up There, I'm F*cked, has been described as Tina Fey's Bossypants meets David Carr's The Night of the Gun. It is a raw look inside the troubled life and mind of an American comic genius. With poignant and hilarious turns, Hammond takes readers from the set of Saturday Night Live, where he was the show'slongest-tenured cast member, to the drug-ridden streets of Harlem and into the twisting corridors of his own unflaggingly humorous consciousness. Mingling behind-the-scenes stories from television's best-loved comedy series with a dark look inside a world-class funnyman, his story is sure to resonate with anyone who shares a talent for performance, a love of comedy, or a desire to know how an artist can climb from the deepest despair to the very top of his profession.

Thursday, Nov. 3, 2011 8pm (Reception 6:30-7:30pm)
Track 16 at Bergamot Station
2525 Michigan Avenue, Bldg C-1
Santa Monica, CA 90404

KCET members receive a 15% discount on tickets. Be sure to use this code at check out: KCET-MEM1. Get tickets.

In a time when we're obsessed with what to eat, the award-winning writer for The New Yorker, and author of the beloved Paris to the Moon has launched a quest for the meaning of food. The Table Comes First: Family, France and the Meaning of Food is Adam Gopnik's new conversation about the way we eat now. He traces how we've lost sight of a timeless truth: that what goes on around the table-- families, friends, lovers coming together, or breaking apart; conversation across the simplest or grandest board-- is always more important than what we put on the table.

Adam Gopnik has been writing for The New Yorker since 1986. During his tenure at the magazine, he has written fiction and humor pieces, book reviews, Profiles, reporting pieces, and more than a hundred stories for The Talk of the Town and Comment.

Gopnik became The New Yorker's art critic in 1987. In 1990, he collaborated with Kirk Varnedoe, the former curator of painting and sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art, on the exhibition "High & Low: Modern Art and Popular Culture," and co-wrote the book of the same name. In 1995, Gopnik moved to Paris and began writing the Paris Journal column for the magazine. An expanded collection of his essays from Paris, Paris to the Moon, appeared in 2000. He is author of the adventure novel, The King in the Window, and edited the anthology Americans in Paris, for the Library of America.

Gopnik has won the National Magazine Award for Essays and for Criticism three times, and also the George Polk Award for Magazine Reporting.

Ed Zwick is an acclaimed director and producer whose films are heralded for addressing difficult moral issues. They include Glory, Legends, Blood Diamond and Defiance. Zwick shared the Oscar for best picture for producing Shakespeare in Love and won an Oscar nomination for producing Traffic. His groundbreaking television shows include Thirtysomething and My So-Called Life.

Monday, Oct. 24, 2011 8pm (Reception 6:30-7:30pm)
Track 16 at Bergamot Station
2525 Michigan Avenue, Bldg C-1
Santa Monica, CA 90404

KCET members receive a 15% discount on tickets. Be sure to use this code at check out: KCET-MEM1. Get tickets.

In his first book, Steve Inskeep, co-host of NPR's Morning Edition, explores how rural-to-urban migration has transformed one of the world's most intriguing places, the booming commercial center of Pakistan. Instant City: Life and Death in Karachi looks at the perils and possibilities of one of the most rapidly growing metropolises in the world. Despite the violence that frequently consumes Karachi, Inskeep finds remarkable signs of the city's tolerance, vitality, and thriving civil society--from a world-renowned ambulance service to a socially innovative project that helps residents of the vast squatter neighborhoods find their own solutions to sanitation, health care, and education.

Inskeep has traveled across the nation and around the world for Morning Edition and NPR News. From the Persian Gulf to the wreckage of New Orleans, he has interviewed presidents, warlords, authors, and musicians, as well as those who aren't in the headlines -- from a steelworker in Ohio to a woman living in poverty in Tehran.

Inskeep's first full-time assignment for NPR was the 1996 presidential primary in New Hampshire. He went on to cover the Pentagon, the Senate, and the 2000 presidential campaign of George W. Bush.

After the September 11 attacks, Inskeep covered the war in Afghanistan, the hunt for al-Qaeda suspects in Pakistan, and the war in Iraq. In 2003, he received a National Headliner Award for investigating a military raid that went wrong in Afghanistan. Here's more about Steve Inskeep on the NPR website.

Renee Montagne is co-host of NPR's Morning Edition. She has hosted the newsmagazine since 2004, broadcasting from NPR West in Culver City, California, with co-host Steve Inskeep in NPR's Washington, D.C. headquarters.

Montagne is a familiar voice on NPR, having reported and hosted since the mid-1980s. She hosted All Things Considered with Robert Siegel for two years in the late 1980s, and previously worked for NPR's Science, National and Foreign desks.

Since 9-11, Montagne has gone to Afghanistan six times, traveling throughout the country and interviewing farmers and mullahs, women and poll workers, the president and an infamous warlord. She spent a month during the summer of 2009 reporting on the Afghanistan politics and election. She has produced three series: 2002′s "Recreating Afghanistan"; 2004′s "Afghanistan Votes"; and 2006′s "The War: Five Years On." To learn more about Renee Montagne, visit her page at the NPR website.

Tuesday, Oct. 18, 2011 8pm (Reception 6:30-7:30pm)
Track 16 at Bergamot Station
2525 Michigan Avenue, Bldg C-1
Santa Monica, CA 90404A

KCET members receive a 15% discount on tickets. Be sure to use this code at check out: KCET-MEM1. Get tickets.

Jerry West is one of basketball's towering figures: "Mr. Clutch," who mesmerized his opponents and fans; the coach who began the Lakers' resurgence in the 1970s; the general manager who helped bring "Showtime" to Los Angeles, creating a championship-winning force that continues to this day.

Now, for the first time, West tells his story-from his tough childhood in West Virginia, to his unbelievable college success at West Virginia University, his 40-year career with the Los Angeles Lakers, and his relationships with NBA legends like Bill Russell, Wilt Chamberlain, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson, Shaquille O'Neal, and Kobe Bryant. His long-awaited book West by West: My Charmed, Tormented Life is far more than a sports memoir.

Peter Guber is Chairman and CEO of the multimedia Mandalay Entertainment Group. Prior to Mandalay, Guber was Chairman and CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment, Chairman and CEO of Polygram Entertainment, Co-Founder of Casablanca Record & Filmworks and President of Columbia Pictures. Guber produced or executive produced (personally or through his companies) films that garnered five Best Picture Academy Award nominations (winning for Rain Man) and box office hits that include The Color Purple, Midnight Express, Batman, Flashdance and The Kids Are All Right. Peter Guber is the Owner and Co-executive Chairman of the NBA franchise, the Golden State Warriors. He is as a weekly entertainment and media analyst for Fox Business News and a full professor at UCLA. Guber serves on the board of directors of Demand Media and is Co-Founder of Geek Chic Daily, a daily email newsletter with inside information on technology & apps, video games, comics, TV & film. Peter Guber is a noted author with works including "Inside The Deep" and "Shootout: Surviving Fame and (Mis)Fortune in Hollywood." Guber wrote the cover article for the Harvard Business Review titled," The Four Truths of the Storyteller" and has also authored op-ed pieces for the New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle. Guber recently released his third book, Tell To Win - Connect, Persuade, and Triumph with the Hidden Power of Story.

KCET members receive a 15% discount on tickets. Be sure to use this code at check out: KCET-MEM1. Get tickets.

How did the universe emerge? What is the nature of time? What is life? What makes us human? What is the connection between mind and brain? Bestselling authors Deepak Chopra and Leonard Mlodinow first met in a televised Caltech debate on "the future of God," one an articulate advocate for spirituality, the other a prominent physicist. War of the Worldviews: Science versus Spirituality is the product of that serendipitous encounter and the contentious--but respectful--clash that grew out of the friendship between these two great thinkers. See them live as they probe the fundamental questions that define the human experience.

Deepak Chopra, a best-selling author, and the founder of the Chopra Center for Wellbeing speaks and writes extensively on the field of mind-body healing and human empowerment. Heralded by Time Magazine as the "poet-prophet of alternative medicine," he is also the host of the popular weekly Wellness Radio program on Sirius/XM Stars. He is the prolific author of more than fifty-five books, including fourteen bestsellers on mind-body health, quantum mechanics, spirituality, and peace. His New York Times bestseller Peace Is the Way won a prestigious Quill Award, and The Book of Secrets was awarded the grand prize at the 2005 Nautilus Book Awards; his bestselling novel, Jesus: A Story of Enlightenment, was released in 2008. He is a columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle and Washington Post On Faith and contributes regularly to Intent.com and the Huffington Post.

Dr. Chopra is a fellow of the American College of Physicians, a member of the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists, an adjunct professor at Kellogg School of Management, and a senior scientist with the Gallup Organization. Visit his website.

A physicist and author of seven books that have appeared in 25 languages, Leonard Mlodinow's The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives was a New York Times bestseller, editor's choice, and notable book of the year, and was short-listed for the Royal Society book award. His most recent book, The Grand Design, co-authored with Stephen Hawking, reached number one on the New York Times list. Mlodinow has also written two children's books, and for various network television series, including MacGyver, Star Trek, Next Generation, and Night Court.

Mlodinow received his PhD in theoretical physics from the University of California at Berkeley, was an Alexander von Humboldt Fellow at the Max-Planck-Institute fuer Physik und Astrophysik in Munich, and a member of the physics faculty at the California Institute of Technology. Visit his website.

Patt Morrison is a longtime reporter and columnist for the Los Angeles Times, where she has won numerous awards, including a share of two Pulitzer Prizes. In addition to the Times, Morrison is host of the Patt Morrison Show on KPCC. She is a regular commentator on National Public Radio's Morning Edition and has published a best-selling book on the Los Angeles River. She is frequently interviewed about Southern California on the BBC and other television and radio programs, and was a founding host of Life & Times on KCET-TV, for which she won six Emmys and six Golden Mike awards.

Sunday, October 2, 2011, 7pm (Reception 5:30-6:30pm)
Club Nokia at L.A. Live
Downtown Los Angeles

KCET members receive a 15% discount on tickets. Be sure to use this code at check out: KCET-MEM1. Get tickets.

Though she's one of the hottest actresses in Hollywood today, Jane Lynch is anything but an overnight success. At age 50, she didn't come into her own until the last decade. Before she landed her role in Glee, she'd battled alcoholism and anxiety, learned to embrace her sexuality, and accepted that life is sometimes a series of opportunities that come after what seem, at the time, like disappointments. Funny, poignant and brutally honest, her book Happy Accidents is one part comic-memoir of behind-the-scenes-Hollywood and one part inspirational-narrative about self-acceptance.

"If I could go back in time and talk to my twenty-year-old self, the first thing I would say is: 'Lose the perm.' Secondly I would say: 'Relax. Really. Just relax. Don't sweat it...Be easy on your sweet self. And don't drink Miller Lite tall boys in the morning." -- Jane Lynch

A Frosted Flakes commercial and a chance meeting in a coffee shop led to a role in the Christopher Guest movie Best in Show, which helped her get cast in The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Similar coincidences and chance meetings led to roles in movies starring Will Ferrell, Paul Rudd, and Meryl Streep in 2009′s Julie & Julia. A series she'd signed up for abruptly got canceled, making it possible for her to take the role of Sue Sylvester in Glee. She has also appeared in For Your Consideration, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Rick Bobby, A Mighty Wind and numerous television shows. She is host of the Emmys on September 18th as only the third woman to host it solo in the show's history.

Adam Scott stars on NBC's Emmy nominated comedy "Parks and Recreation" opposite Amy Poehler and also gained notoriety for his performances on the Starz comedy series "Party Down" where he starred alongside Jane Lynch and in the hit comedy "Step Brothers" with Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly. He will next be seen in "Our Idiot Brother," opposite Paul Rudd, and his film "Friends with Kids," is set to premiere at this year's Toronto International Film Festival. Additionally, he has wrapped production on See Girl Run and Paramount's My Mother's Curse with Seth Rogen and Barbra Streisand. He is currently in production on The Bachelorette and recently signed on to topline the indie comedy A.C.O.D., an acronym for Adult Children of Divorce.

Thursday, September 22, 2011, 8pm (Reception 6:30-7:30pm)
Track 16 at Bergamot Station
2525 Michigan Avenue, Bldg C-1
Santa Monica, CA 90404

KCET members receive a 15% discount on tickets. Be sure to use this code at check out: KCET-MEM1. Get tickets.

Pulitzer-prize winning humorist Dave Barry and prolific best-selling suspense novelist Ridley Pearson may not seem like obvious collaborators. But with the sixth in their series Peter and the Starcatchers: Bridge to Never Land, they're re-enforcing their place as the dynamic young-adult duo. Come hear them commiserate about their latest beloved prequel to the classic Peter Pan, and what it's like to write together. They are the coauthors of Peter and the Starcatchers, Peter and the Shadow Thieves, Peter and the Secret of Rundoon, Peter and the Sword of Mercy, Escape from the Carnivale, Cave of the Dark Wind, Blood Tide, and Science Fair. Both are founding members of the all-author rock band, The Rock Bottom Remainders who, after 20 years are still trying to stay on key. Other members include Stephen King, Amy Tan, Ridley Pearson, and Mitch Albom. They are not musically skilled, but they are extremely loud.

Dave Barry is a humor columnist. For 25 years he was a syndicated columnist whose work appeared in more than 500 newspapers in the United States and abroad. In 1988 he won the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary. Many people are still trying to figure out how this happened.

Dave has also written more than 30 books, including Dave Barry's History of the Millennium (So Far); The Shepherd, the Angel, and Walter the Christmas Miracle Dog; Dave Barry's Money Secrets; and Big Trouble. Dave has also made many TV appearances, including one on the David Letterman show where he proved that it is possible to set fire to a pair of men's underpants with a Barbie doll. Neither of his children think he's funny.

Ridley Pearson is a best-selling adult crime novelist with more than 25 titles, which have been translated into 22 languages and distributed in 70 countries. Pearson was the first U.S. citizen to be awarded the Raymond Chandler/Fulbright Fellowship in Detective Fiction at Oxford University. Among his adult thrillers are: Killer Weekend, Cut and Run, The Pied Piper, The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer, Beyond Recognition, and Undercurrents.

He is also author the fantastical YA thriller series, the Kingdom Keepers, the latest of which is Kingdom Keepers lll: Disney in Shadow. Others include Kingdom Keepers: Disney After Dark and Kingdom Keepers II: Disney at Dawn, as well as Steel Trapp--The Challenge and Steel Trapp--and The Academy.

Thursday, September 8, 2011, 8pm
Track 16 at Bergamot Station
2525 Michigan Avenue, Bldg C-1
Santa Monica, CA 90404

KCET members receive a 15% discount on tickets. Be sure to use this code at check out: KCET-MEM1. Get tickets.

For 50 years, acclaimed actor Hal Holbrook has vividly brought characters to life on the stage and screen. His new memoir, Harold: The Boy Who Became Mark Twain, reveals how he overcame childhood abandonment to reach such success. Publishers Weekly calls Harold "movingly honest" and Robert Redford says it's a "beautifully composed story of self-determination and survival." See Hal Holbrook live in an intimate setting as details the sacrifices and difficult choices he's made along the way in his storied career.

Hal Holbrook has starred in such films as All the President's Men, Wall Street, and The Firm. He has won five prime-time Emmy Awards for his work in television, and was nominated for an Academy Award in 2008 for his role in Into the Wild. He has done his one man show as Mark Twain since 1954.

Robert Patrick is one of the most recognizable faces in Hollywood today-often playing the memorable yet terrifying villain. His role in Terminator 2 made him famous. He's also played Johnny Cash's father in the film Walk the Line and Elvis's father in the Golden Globe and Emmy award-winning TV mini-series Elvis. A skilled martial artist who has also appeared on The X-Files and The Sopranos, Patrick was once called one of the Ten Sexiest Men of Sci-Fi, and often rides in a charity motorcycle fundraiser called the Love Ride.

Pu

Scott Turow in conversation Dustin Hoffman from Ted Habte-Gabr on Vimeo.