Curtis Sittenfeld presents Romantic Comedy // with Julie Schumacher

Presented by

Monday, April 10, 2023

6 pm Doors // 7 pm Event

$41 Advance General Admission + Copy of Romantic Comedy // $51 At The Door

$15 Advance General Admission // $21 At The Door

All Ages

Ticket Purchases are Final and Non-Refundable

Minnesota author Julie Schumacher will moderate the evening, followed by a book signing.

Presented by Magers & Quinn Booksellers.

Romantic Comedy is the hilarious, observant, and deeply tender story of a comedy writer who thinks she’s sworn off love, until a dreamy pop star flips the script on all her assumptions.

Sally Milz is a sketch writer for The Night Owls, a late-night live comedy show that airs every Saturday. With a couple of heartbreaks under her belt, she’s long abandoned the search for love, settling instead for the occasional hook-up, career success, and a close relationship with her stepfather to round out a satisfying life.

But when Sally’s friend and fellow writer Danny Horst begins dating Annabel, a glamorous actress who guest-hosted the show, he joins the not-so-exclusive group of talented but average-looking and even dorky men at the show—and in society at large—who’ve gotten romantically involved with incredibly beautiful and accomplished women. Sally channels her annoyance into a sketch called the Danny Horst Rule, poking fun at this phenomenon while underscoring how unlikely it is that the reverse would ever happen for a woman.

Enter Noah Brewster, a pop music sensation with a reputation for dating models, who signed on as both host and musical guest for this week’s show. Dazzled by his charms, Sally hits it off with Noah instantly, and as they collaborate on one sketch after another, she begins to wonder if there might actually be sparks flying. But this isn’t a romantic comedy—it’s real life. And in real life, someone like him would never date someone like her . . . right?

With her keen observations and trademark ability to bring complex women to life on the page, Curtis Sittenfeld explores the neurosis-inducing and heart-fluttering wonder of love, while slyly dissecting the social rituals of romance and gender relations in the modern age.

Curtis Sittenfeld is the New York Times bestselling author of six novels including Rodham, Eligible, Prep, American Wife, and Sisterland, as well as the collection You Think It, I’ll Say It. Her novels have been translated into thirty languages. In addition, her short stories have appeared in The New Yorker, The Washington Post Magazine, Esquire, and The Best American Short Stories, for which she has also been the guest editor. Her nonfiction has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Time, and Vanity Fair, and on public radio’s This American Life. Her seventh novel Romantic Comedy will be published in April.

Julie Schumacher is the author of ten books, including the national best-seller, Dear Committee Members, for which she won the Thurber Prize for American Humor — she is the first woman to have won the Thurber Prize. Schumacher is a Regents Professor of Creative Writing and English at the University of Minnesota. The final book in her academic trilogy, The English Experience, will be available from Doubleday in August 2023.

Host or Publisher The Parkway Theater