INTRODUCTION TO THE 2024 Season: Family. Chosen & Blood
Comprising letters and documents from two very different kinds of families: families we are born with and those we choose. The first subject belongs to the first category, Josephine Louise Newcomb. Her’s is a family saga that turns venal. The second is the latter category with four case studies from the early days of the HIV | AIDS crisis in the late 20th century. These stories are presented in five-minute, incubator-style, experimental podcasts. The Newcomb and HIV | AIDS readings continue the 2023-24 theme, New York/New Orleans, and are live performances. Links to recordings for these are provided.
2004 LETTERS FROM THE 1980S HIV/AIDS EPIDEMIC.
In partnership with the LGBT+ Archives Project of Louisiana, Letters Read is producing four, incubator-style, mini-podcasts on early HIV/AIDS awareness and activism in New Orleans, Louisiana, and the country at large. Each launches on the dates that follow and remains available thereafter.
DIRECTOR’S PREAMBLE AVAILABLE HERE.
June 6 Mark Gonzalez, protest, and ACT UP. LISTEN HERE.
Aug 8 Noel Twilbeck and Crescent Care, LISTEN HERE.
Oct 18 Brad Ott, Activism & Underground Publishing, LISTEN HERE.
Dec 5 Pierre Rene “Peter” DeLancey, LISTEN HERE.
Dec 11 AIDS Hospice and Hywel Sims, LISTEN HERE.
October 29, 2024
THE JOSEPHINE LOUISE NEWCOMB STORY
Newcomb Institute, Tulane University.
A second reading from the archives of Josephine Louise Newcomb. Listen to a recording HERE.
Emcee and Readers: Nick Slie, Lisa Shattuck, Shadow Angelina Starkey, and Robert Valley
H. Sophie Newcomb Memorial College was established by Josephine Louise Le Monnier Newcomb (“Jo”) as she was called, 1816 to 1901) as a memorial to her daughter Sophie who died at the age of 15. At a time when women were discouraged from education, an institution devoted to higher learning for women was a revolutionary idea.
Ladies of Mrs. Newcomb’s privileged class were instead taught to have “accomplishments”. Such as parlor entertainments like piano playing and polite conversation. For the lower classes—who had to hire themselves out as domestic help to survive—cooking, cleaning, sewing, nursing, and caregiving for other people’s families were their lot. For them, education, such as it were, was learned scrubbing pots on the job.
Until its post-Katrina consolidation into Tulane University, Newcomb College was a separate, four-year, baccalaureate-giving institution. Entirely – for – women.
Through Josephine Louise Newcomb’s letters, this reading tells that tale. It was created in grateful partnership with Susan Tucker and Beth Willinger. In great part, this presentation relies on their scholarship, insights, and their project of the same name, The Letters of Josephine Louise Newcomb.
Letters Read is an ongoing series in which local performers interpret letters and written documents about culturally vital individuals from various times and Louisiana communities—focusing on New Orleans.
April 13, 2024
THE LETTERS OF JOSEPHINE LOUISE NEWCOMB
Catapult, New Orleans
A podcast of the performance is available HERE.
H. Sophie Newcomb Memorial College was established by Josephine Louise Monnier Newcomb (“Jo”) as she was called, 1816 to 1901) as a memorial to her daughter Sophie who died at the age of 15. At a time when women were discouraged from education, an institution devoted to higher learning for women was a revolutionary idea. With Chris Kamenstein, Shadow Angelina Starkey, and Robert Valley.
Ladies of Mrs. Newcomb’s privileged class were instead taught to have “accomplishments”. Such as parlor entertainments like piano playing and polite conversation. For the lower classes—who had to hire themselves out as domestic help to survive—cooking, cleaning, sewing, nursing, and caregiving for other people’s families were their lot. For them, education, such as it were, was learned scrubbing pots on the job.
Until its post-Katrina consolidation into Tulane University, Newcomb College was a separate, four-year, baccalaureate-giving institution. Entirely – for – women.
Through Josephine Louise Newcomb’s letters, this project tells that tale. The series is created in grateful partnership with Susan Tucker and Beth Willinger. In great part, it relies on their scholarship, insights, and their project of the same name, The Letters of Josephine Louise Newcomb.
Thanks to the generous donations making this season possible, Corner Foundation, and funds “from an admiring patron”. Special thanks, too, to writer/researcher, Jarret Lofstead and audio engineer Steve Gilliland.
March 10, 2024
LETTERS OF JOSEPHINE LOUISE NEWCOMB
A Preview Reading
The Mudlark Theatre
Letters Read collaborates with Rubber Flower for a spoken word production. Taking the opportunity to introduce the Josephine Louise Newcomb saga to be performed over the 2024 season.
The evening begins with micro treats by the producer of Letters Read, Nancy Sharon Collins, and visual artist Ryan Leitner. It then features poet Ben Fluet and fictionist Terra Travis.
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2023 SEASON: NEW YORK/NEW ORLEANS
INCUBATOR XI.
WATER & SALT: Two Cities’ Dilemmas.
This production was created from material collected during the creation of Drugs, Sex, Rock & Roll: A Year of Magic and Wonder. That coincided with the project’s director/writer’s move back from New York to New Orleans. Quoting from the script, Collins’s observation was that moving home was “kind of like sleeping with an old lover.”
Meanwhile, significant municipal water issues collided in both cities and, in the Middle East. Podcast Sunday, November 5, and thereafter. LISTEN HERE.
October 20, 2024
DRUGS, SEX, ROCK & ROL: A year of magic and wonder.
An oft-experienced tale of the Big Easy luring an innocent, out-of-towner, to the dark side.
This specific story, ca. 1985, focuses on one, one incredibly transformative year. For one man. Emblematic of many attracted to New Orleans for its louche way of life.
This potentially tragic tale resolves itself into a beautiful, tie-dye butterfly. In which a Tulane undergraduate magically emerges going on to a fulfilling queer life and hugely successful, big city, New York City career.
Geoff Munsterman reads as the subject. Named James, just James. Shadow Angelina Starkey reads as Nancy Sharon Collins, the project director. Historic context has been corroborated by consultant, Royd Anderson. Munsterman and Starkey produced it.
You can access the podcast HERE.
July 16, 2024
Robert Moses and New Orleans’s Riverfront Expressway.
Listen to the podcast HERE.
Continuing our New York/New Orleans journey, we bring you the only project Robert Moses ever did in the Crescent City. With his usual team of engineers and urbanists, he directed a report with suggestions to solve traffic congestion in the Big Easy. Locally, this project—or part of it—is referred to as the Riverfront Expressway.
Robert Moses, the greatest builder New York has ever known, is so often credited with it that it is almost funny that it did not even happen. As frequently as he is credited with the project that never was, he is also incorrectly blamed for the Claiborne Expressway. That, horrendously, did.
This podcast is part of the ongoing script development for a fully realized live performance later this year about Moses, his portion of the report, and the historic outcomes.
The reading is based on primary source research in The Robert Moses Collection at the New York Public Library and Moses’ 1946 “Arterial Plan of New Orleans” commissioned by the state of Louisiana. Additional information comes from newspaper articles, past and current, hearsay, Facebook, Robert Caro’s The Power Broker, Richard Baumbach and William Borah’s The Second Battle of New Orleans, and Hilary Ballon’s Robert Moses and the Modern City.
For information on the current fight to remove the Claiborne Overpass and links to other resources used for this production, go to HERE.
April 30, 2024
Orange Couch
Free and open to the public and covered by Stefanie Russell on Historia. This is the first live event since October 26, 2019. An informal reading excerpted from the full Robert Moses script being produced for the live event later this year. Here is what it’s all about:
Robert Moses, New York City, and the state’s greatest builder. Respected and reviled. In 1945, Moses was contracted by the state of Louisiana to evaluate, and recommend, remedies for common, mid-20th-century problems such as traffic congestion.
While many of his plan’s ideas were implemented over time, the Riverfront Expressway never materialized.
Excerpts are from Robert Moses’s writings, letters, and other contemporaneous articles. Primary source material from the New Orleans Public Library, the Historic New Orleans Collection’s Williams Research Center, and Robert Moses papers. Manuscripts and Archives Division. The New York Public Library. Astor, Lenox, and Tilden Foundations.
Amidst the post-World War II automobile-based transportation frenzy, the 1946 “Arterial Plan for New Orleans” was published. Commissioned by Louisiana state’s Department of Highways and directed by New York master planner Robert Moses. This report outlined the modernization of all Crescent City transportation. In addition to advocating for the high-speed movement of automobiles through a historically rich urban center–the French Quarter—the report planned for new, more efficient railways, airports, shipping canals, and yes, monumental parking garages.
At its heart was an elevated, riverfront expressway. Later known as the Riverfront Expressway. It would separate the historic Vieux Carré and the Pontalba Plaza from the Mississippi riverfront entirely. Literally throwing the historic residential neighborhood, a significant tourist destination, into the shadows.
April 28, 2024
ROBERT MOSES: A Dress Rehearsal.
Christopher Kamenstein, Goat in the Road Productions co-creative director, reads as Robert Moses.
David Zalkind, Frenchman Art & Books, read contextual information.
The work in progress. A rehearsal for the script in development for the live production later this year.
The subject is Robert Moses. Born 1888. Deceased 1981.
Visionary urban planner. Who changed the mid-twentieth century built environment of New York City and New York State in a manner still seen and experienced today. The municipal projects he brought to fruition were massive in scale. Damns. Bridges. Parkways, toll roads, and highways. Superhighways.
Moses envisioned a spectacular web of high-speed roads moving hundreds of thousands of cars carrying freight and people. Since the 1920s, other city planners had dreamed of this. No one. No one could figure out how. Robert Moses did.
March 20, 2024
INCUBATOR X.
INTRODUCING THE 2023 SEASON, DIRECTOR’S NOTE.
The 10th Incubator short. Another experimental-style podcast by stationer, Nancy Sharon Collins, the project director. It is the first to be recorded in The Big Apple. In a pre-war, studio apartment ’round the corner from the monumental, Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge. This reading will introduce the 2023 theme, New York / New Orleans. Total listening time: under 6 minutes and 3 seconds. Click HERE to listen.
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November 5, 2023
INCUBATOR XI.
WATER & SALT Two Cities’ Dilemmas.
This production was created from material collected during the creation of Drugs, Sex, Rock & Roll: A Year of Magic and Wonder. Which coincided with the project’s director/writer’s move back from New York to New Orleans. Quoting from the script, Collins’s observation was that moving home was “kind of like sleeping with an old lover.” Meanwhile, significant municipal water issues collided in both cities and, in the Middle East. Podcast Sunday, November 5, and thereafter. LISTEN HERE.
October 20, 2023
DRUGS, SEX, ROCK & ROLL A year of magic and wonder.
Listen to an oft-experienced tale of the Big Easy luring an innocent, out-of-towner, to the dark side. This specific story, ca. 1985, focuses on one, one incredibly transformative year. For one man. Emblematic of many attracted to New Orleans for its louche way of life.
This potentially tragic tale resolves itself into a beautiful, tie-dye butterfly. In which a Tulane undergraduate magically emerges going on to a fulfilling queer life and hugely successful, big city, New York City career.
Geoff Munsterman reads as the subject. Named James, just James. Shadow Angelina Starkey reads as Nancy Sharon Collins, the project director. Historic context corroborated by consultant, Royd Anderson. Munsterman and Starkey produced it. Listen HERE.
July 16, 2023
ROBERT MOSES AND NEW ORLEANS’S RIVERFRONT EXPRESSWAY.
Continuing the New York/New Orleans journey, we bring you the only project Robert Moses ever did in the Crescent City. With his usual team of engineers and urbanists, he directed a report with suggestions to solve traffic congestion in the Big Easy. Locally, this project—or part of it—is called the Riverfront Expressway. Listen HERE.
Robert Moses, the greatest builder New York has ever known, is so often credited with it that it is almost funny that it did not even happen. As frequently as he is credited with the project that never was, he is also incorrectly blamed for the Claiborne Expressway. That, horrendously, did.
This podcast is part of the ongoing script development for a fully realized live performance later this year about Moses, his portion of the report, and the historical outcomes.
The reading is based on primary source research in The Robert Moses Collection at the New York Public Library and Moses’ 1946 “Arterial Plan of New Orleans” commissioned by the state of Louisiana. Additional information comes from newspaper articles, past and current, hearsay, Facebook, Robert Caro’s The Power Broker, Richard Baumbach and William Borah’s The Second Battle of New Orleans, and Hilary Ballon’s Robert Moses and the Modern City.
For information on the current fight to remove the Claiborne Overpass and links to other resources used for this production, go to HERE.
April 30, 2023
Orange Couch.
Free and open to the public and covered by Stefanie Russell on Historia. This is the first live event since October 26, 2019. An informal reading excerpted from the full Robert Moses script being produced for the live event later this year. Here is what it’s all about:
Robert Moses, New York City, and the state’s greatest builder. Respected and reviled. In 1945, Moses was contracted by the state of Louisiana to evaluate, and recommend, remedies for common, mid-20th-century problems such as traffic congestion.
While many of his plan’s ideas were implemented over time, the Riverfront Expressway never materialized.
Excerpts are from Robert Moses’s own writings, letters, and other contemporaneous articles. Primary source material from the New Orleans Public Library, the Historic New Orleans Collection’s Williams Research Center, and Robert Moses papers. Manuscripts and Archives Division. The New York Public Library. Astor, Lenox, and Tilden Foundations.
Amidst the post-World War II automobile-based transportation frenzy, the 1946 “Arterial Plan for New Orleans” was published. Commissioned by Louisiana state’s Department of Highways and directed by New York master planner Robert Moses. This report outlined the modernization of all Crescent City transportation. In addition to advocating for the high-speed movement of automobiles through a historically rich urban center–the French Quarter—the report planned for new, more efficient railways, airports, shipping canals, and yes, monumental parking garages.
At its heart was an elevated, riverfront expressway. Later known as the Riverfront Expressway. It would separate the historic Vieux Carré and the Pontalba Plaza from the Mississippi riverfront. Throwing the historic residential neighborhood, a significant tourist destination, into the shadows.
April 28, A Dress Rehearsal.
Christopher Kamenstein, Goat in the Road Productions co-creative director, reads as Robert Moses.
David Zalkind, Frenchman Art & Books.
A work in progress. The subject is Robert Moses. Born 1888. Deceased 1981.
Visionary urban planner. Who changed the mid-twentieth century built environment of New York City and New York State in a manner still seen and experienced today. The municipal projects he brought to fruition were massive in scale. Damns. Bridges. Parkways, toll roads, and highways. Superhighways.
Moses envisioned a spectacular web of high-speed roads moving hundreds of thousands of cars carrying freight and people. Since the 1920s, other city planners have dreamed of this. No one. No one could figure out how. Robert Moses did.
March 20, INCUBATOR X.
Introducing the 2023 Season, Director’s Note.
The 10th Incubator short. Another experimental-style podcast by stationer, Nancy Sharon Collins, the project director. It is the first to be recorded in The Big Apple. In a pre-war, studio apartment ’round the corner from the monumental, Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge. This reading will introduce the 2023 theme, New York / New Orleans. Total listening time: under 6 minutes and 3 seconds. Click HERE to listen.
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New Year’s Eve, 2022
Lemons to Lemonade, Magen Raine Gladden. The final second lady Louisiana artist in the 2022 cycle.
Geoff Munsterman narrates. Shadow Angelina Starkey reads as Gladden.
LISTEN HERE
Thanksgiving, 2022
Letters from the Street.
Literally sourced from New Orleans’s streets. Missives of all kinds. Notices, notes-to-self, lists, recipes, and formulas.
LISTEN HERE
September 28, 2022
Angela Gregory. The second lady Louisiana artist in the 2022 cycle.
Letters and missives to and from this eco-feminist artist, and Letters Read Executive Advisory Board member. Christopher Kamenstein reads Varisco’s letters and other correspondence of interest. Audio production by Steve Chyzyk, Sonic Canvas Studio.
LISTEN HERE
June 24, 2022
Michel Varisco. Presenting the first lady Louisiana artist in the 2022 cycle.
Letters and missives to and from this eco-feminist artist, and Letters Read Executive Advisory Board member. Christopher Kamenstein reads Varisco’s letters and other correspondence of interest. Audio production by Steve Chyzyk, Sonic Canvas Studio.
LISTEN HERE
April 1, 2022
The Only Person Ever Brought to Trial for Conspiracy to Assassinate President John F. Kennedy.
Robert Valley reads as the voice of Shaw, David Zalkind is Jim Garrison. Audio production is by Steve Chyzyk, Sonic Canvas Studio.
LISTEN HERE
December 31, 2021
INCUBATOR VIII: Mid-20th Century Foreign Intrigue & the Almighty American Dollar
Prelude to the April 1, 2022 reading, The Only Person Brought to Trial for Conspiracy to Assassinate President John F. Kennedy.
LISTEN HERE
November 25, 2021
Mad Men New Orleans-style!
Reading by Colin B. Miller. Audio production Steve Chyzyk and Steve Himelfarb, Sonic Canvas Studio and Paul Broussard for additional recording.
LISTEN HERE
November 7, 2021
INCUBATOR VIII: The Power of a Personal Letter
Prelude to the Thanksgiving, 2021 reading Mad Men.
Ron Thomson’s story about the letter he wrote to movie star Audrey Hepburn.
LISTEN HERE
July 15, 2021
Bananas Anyone?
Reading from a 1906 photo-album compiled in response to the last documented yellow fever outbreak in New Orleans and the United States. Readers are William Bowling and Grace Kennedy. Audio production by Steve Chyzyk and Sonic Canvas Studio.
LISTEN HERE
July 12, 2021
INCUBATOR VII: Yellow Fever, Mosquitos, and Monkeys
Prelude to the July 25, 2021 podcast, Bananas Anyone, project director Nancy Sharon Collins puts forth a science fiction theory to microbiology scholar Claiborne Christian, Ph.D., Tulane University, New Orleans.
LISTEN HERE
March 25, 2021
The Letters of Edgar Degas
Christopher Kamenstein reads as Degas.
Audio production by Steve Steve Chyzyk, Sonic Canvas Studio.
Nancy Sharon Collins, program director, emcees.
LISTEN HERE
March 18, 2021
INCUBATOR VI: Michel Musson, 1849
Prelude to the March 25, 2021 reading, The Letters of Edgar Degas.
LISTEN HERE
December 31st, 2020
A Conversation with Two Actors
A remote interview with two professional actors,
George Saucier and Colin Miller.
Audio production by Steve Steve Chyzyk, and Steve Himelfarb,
LISTEN HERE
August 20, 2020
The Letters of Skip Ward
A podcast hosted by:
Alexandria Museum of Art
Alexandria, Louisiana.
LISTEN HERE
April 26
, 2020
The Letters of Stewart Butler
The 14th Letters Read and first produced remotely and podcast.
LISTEN TO THE PODCAST HERE
Readers: Dylan Hunter, Rebecca Hollingsworth, and emcee is Frank Perez.
Audio engineer Dylan Hunter as well.
Music is written and performed by Rob Hudak.
March 29, 2020
CANCELED Due to the Corona Virus Outbreak
Taboo Busting, a panel discussion
Hotel Monteleone, Riverview Room
Panelists: Dr. Thomas Bonner, Jr., John Whittier Treat, Marion Hill.
In conjunction with the New Orleans Tennessee Williams Literary Festival and the Saints and Sinners conference.
January 10, 2020
INCUBATOR III: A Preliminary Reading of Personal Letters to Stewart Butler
LISTEN HERE
October 26, 2019
LETTERS READ Anniversary & Fundraising Bash
4:00 to 4:45 pm
Orange Couch
2339 Royal St, New Orleans
The special reading by Christopher Kamenstein and project director, stationer, Nancy Sharon Collins.
September 25, 2019
LETTERS READ: Baroness de Pontalba
Louisiana State Museum
The Cabildo
701 Charters Street, New Orleans
August 25th, 2019
LETTERS READ: Lafcadio Hearn, Revisited
Crescent City Books
124 Baronne Street, New Orleans
July 20, 2019
LETTERS READ: CODEX II Open Mic Night
Crescent City Books
124 Baronne Street, across from the Roosevelt Hotel, New Orleans
Watch and listen to Charlie Bishop talk about erasing his doctoral dissertation here.
February 13, 2019
LETTERS READ: The Desegregation of New Orleans Public Libraries
Nora Navra Library
1902 St. Bernard Avenue, New Orleans
Listen to the performance here.
November 25, 2018
LETTERS READ: The nature of property, property ownership, and the origins of Felicity Redevelopment.
St John the Baptist Catholic Church
1139 Oretha Castle Haley Blvd., New Orleans
June 29, 2018
LETTERS READ: The Janet Mary Riley letters
Loyola University Special Collections & Archives
J. Edgar & Louise S. Monroe Library
6363 St. Charles Avenue, New Orleans
Listen to the performance here.
June 2, 2018
INCUBATOR II: Dorian Bennett Talks about His Friend Tennessee Williams
LISTEN HERE
March 23, 2018
LETTERS READ: The Luck of Friendship
Le Petit Theatre Du Vieux Carre, French Quarter, New Orleans
Listen to the performance here.
February 14 (that’s right, Valentines Day), 2018
LETTERS READ: Text Dating
Antenna Gallery
3718 Saint Claude Avenue, New Orleans
Listen to the performance here,
and here
November 11, 2017
LETTERS READ: Veterans Day
Bastion
1901 Mirabeau Avenue, New Orleans
Listen to the performance here.
September 13, 2017
LETTERS READ: Letters of Regret
Antenna Gallery
3718 St Claude Avenue, New Orleans
June 29, 2017
LETTERS READ: Hermann and Grima Family Letters
Hermann-Grima House
820 Saint Louis Street, New Orleans
May 23, 2017
LETTERS READ: Lafcadio Hearn, Summer of 1886
Grand Isle Letters from Loyola University New Orleans Special Collections & Archives
Crescent City Books
124 Baronne Street, New Orleans
May 17, 2017
Sneak-peak to LETTERS READ
A Studio In The Woods
13401 Patterson Road, New Orleans