Renowned Actor/Scholar Michael Oakes brings award-winning author John Steinbeck to life.

Born in the central valley of California at the turn of the 20th century, Steinbeck’s love of reading and writing was fostered by his school teacher mother. His summer jobs as a ranch hand helped inspire his future writings, particularly, Of Mice and Men. He attended Stanford, but before he graduated, moved to N.Y. to write, unsuccessfully. Returning to California he married, and gained success writing of the places and people he knew, as in Tortilla Flat, Cannery Row, and The Grapes of Wrath, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1939. His WW II dispatches were collected in Once There Was a War. Other influential writings include The Red Pony, East of Eden, America and the Americans, and Travels with Charley. John Steinbeck's writings continue to inspire many acclaimed screen adaptations.

This one-man show combines selected readings with personal anecdotes to bring to life this seminal American author, whom the Nobel Prize committee cited in 1962 “...for his realistic as well as imaginative writings, distinguished by a sympathetic humor and a keen social perception.”