MONDAY: Tony Kushner will discuss the plays of Arthur Miller with Jeffrey Brown at the Avalon Theatre, 5612 Connecticut Ave NW. Topics may or may not include who the baddest Jewish playwright of our time really is, and whether anyone who convinced the likes of Marilyn Monroe to convert has any competition in that category to begin wtih. Tickets are $13 each; two tickets are included with the purchase of a book. 8:15 p.m.
WEDNESDAY:
Ayelet Waldman deals with marriage, motherhood, and SIDS in her new novel Love and Other Impossible Pursuits. The rest of us deal with the fact that we will never know what it must be like to be one half of contemporary literature’s coolest power couple. At Politics & Prose at 7 p.m. 5015 Connecticut Ave NW.
Get out your trench coats, elongated shadows and pregnant pauses as George Pelecanos, David Slater and Quintin Peterson gather to read from and sign copies of D.C. Noir. Borders, 5871 Crossroads Center Way, Baileys Crossroads at 7 p.m. Free.
Any aspiring journalist who ever read Gay Talese’s story “Mr. Bad News” ought to delight in the chance to catch Marilyn Johnson in conversation with Washington Post obit writer Adam Bernstein, as they discuss The Dead Beat: Lost Souls, Lucky Stiffs, and the Perverse Pleasures of Obituaries. 6:30 p.m. Borders at 18th & L St. NW
THURSDAY:
Well-known lobbyist Michael Berman would like you to stop gossiping about how the smell of corruption now hangs over K Street like a hot dog cart left out in the sun for days and start gossiping about how hugely fat he is. That way maybe he can sell more copies of his new book, Living Large: A Big Man’s Ideas on Weight, Success, and Acceptance. He’ll also be at Olsson’s Penn Quarter/The Lansburgh, 418 7th St., NW. at 7 p.m., where you can ogle his enormity first hand.
FRIDAY:
Bad impersonations will no doubt abound as Dave Kindred stops by Politics and Prose to read from his new book, Sound and Fury, about the fascinating relationship between Howard Cosell and Muhammad Ali. 7 p.m.
