Paula Poundstone returns to the Community Concert Hall Aug. 19
Award-winning humorist brings her razor-sharp stand-up comedy back to Durango
Durango, CO – Considered one of the foremost comics working today, award-winning humorist Paula Poundstone returns to the Community Concert Hall at Fort Lewis College, Friday, Aug. 19, 2016, 7:30 p.m. Show content may not be appropriate for children.
Perhaps most widely known as a panelist on NPR’s popular weekly news quiz program, “Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me,” Poundstone is famous for her razor-sharp wit and spontaneity. Said Peter Sagal, host of “Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me,” “People love Paula Poundstone and they always have. The amazing thing about Paula is that she has an amazingly distinctive personality. You can see a lot of really, really great comedians, but you may walk away without a sense of who they really are…Paula comes out on stage and she starts talking about her life and then 20 minutes later you realize you’re in the middle of her comedy act and didn’t really know it.”
Poundstone began nurturing her stand-up comedy talent in 1979 on the Boston comedy circuit; though by 1990 she had moved to Los Angeles, starred in multiple HBO comedy specials and appeared on “Saturday Night Live.” She was the first woman to receive a Cable ACE Award for a comedy special for her one-hour HBO show “Cats, Cops, and Stuff,” and the first woman invited to entertain at the prestigious White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
Poundstone received a second Cable ACE Award for her self-titled HBO talk show series, as well as an Emmy for her field pieces on the PBS program “Life & Times.” She is recognized as one of Comedy Central’s 100 greatest stand-ups of all time, has won an American Comedy Award for Best Female Standup Comic, and in 2010 was one of a select group voted into the Comedy Hall of Fame.
One of her dreams came true when cast as “Forgetter Paula” in Disney Pixar’s INSIDE OUT, which won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature Film in 2016. On June 28, 2016, her first “double live” CD entitled North by Northwest: Paula Poundstone Live!, debuted at #1 on Amazon’s “Hot New Releases – Non-fiction” list.
Also an author, Poundstone has written two hardcover books, the second to be published by Algonquin Books on May 9, 2017. Her commentaries have been seen on “CBS News Sunday Morning.”
For her live shows Poundstone draws upon her own complex life: three children, multiple cats, a demanding job and crazy travel schedule, and aging, as well as her signature bag of neuroses. Every show is unique as she works with each audience, engaging audience members in humorous dialogue.
About Poundstone’s stand-up, Nick Zaino with the Boston Globe, writes, “You know Poundstone’s a great comic the way you know any fine performer when you see one – there’s a disarming ease in her craft, an immediate sense that she’s so quick on her feet you need never worry about the possibility of something going wrong.”
Listen to Poundstone’s new CD at http://apple.co/29Ijunf http://apple.co/29llq6Z and for a sampling of her extemporaneous wit, watch Poundstone’s appearance on Craig Ferguson’s “The Late Late Show” at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6WnBZ5G6fc.
Tickets for Paula Poundstone – $34/$28 – are available on-line at www.durangoconcerts.com or by calling 970.247.7657, or at the Ticket Office inside the Welcome Center at 8th St. and Main Ave. in Downtown Durango. All sales final.
The Community Concert Hall is a not-for-profit, multi-use performance venue located on the campus of Fort Lewis College. Its ability to bring a diverse spectrum of shows to Southwest Colorado is made possible through a partnership with the college, a state-supported, independent institution of higher education, and through financial and in-kind contributions from generous members of the community.
