S&S Bags Baccarin for Clare’s ‘Lady Midnight’
Currently appearing in Deadpool on the big screen and in TV’s Gotham, actress Morena Baccarin reads Lady Midnight, the first book in Cassandra Clare’s companion trilogy to the Mortal Instruments. The audiobook was released by Simon & Schuster Audio on March 8, the same day Clare kicked off a U.S. and U.K. tour that will wrap up on April 21 in Dublin, Ireland. The first book in her six-volume Mortal Instruments series was adapted for film (The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones), and production company Constantin Films also went on to develop a TV show, Shadowhunters, now airing on Freeform.
Flaming Red in the Booth for Harper’s ‘Fireman’
Taking a break from the TV cell block where she’s known as Red, on the Netflix prison comedy/drama Orange Is the New Black, actress Kate Mulgrew will step up to the microphone to record the chilling tale of a pregnant woman trying to survive a global pandemic of spontaneous combustion in Joe Hill’s latest, The Fireman, due from HarperAudio on May 17.
Williams-Paisley Shares Family Story for Blackstone
Actress Kimberley Williams-Paisley, well-known for her starring turn in the Father of the Bride movies, featuring Steve Martin, and more recently for her supporting role on TV’s Nashville, has recorded her memoir, Where the Light Gets In: Losing My Mother Only to Find Her Again as an April release for Blackstone Audio. The book chronicles how Williams-Paisley and her family have coped with the rare and debilitating form of dementia that has stricken her mother, from the first diagnosis to the present day.
The Audiobook Is out There
Wearing a couple of different artistic hats, The X-Files’ David Duchovny was recently in the studio to read his new novel for Macmillan Audio. In Bucky F*cking Dent, set in 1978, Duchovny introduces Ted, a man who tries to repair his relationship with his estranged and dying father by creating the illusion that the elder man’s favorite baseball team, the Boston Red Sox, is on a winning streak, leading up to the fateful playoff game in which the New York Yankees’ Bucky Dent eliminated the Sox with an unlikely home run.
Random House’s “Crazy Jewish” Audiobook; Scholastic’s Drag Teen
The love affair between social media and publishing continues with two new audio releases. Mother, Can You Not? (Random House Audio, Apr. 5) is a collection of essays by Kate Siegel and her mother, Kim Friedman, the voices behind the popular Instagram account @crazyjewishmom, which features Siegel’s daily posts of texts, emails, and other communications with her mom. The duo recently re-created some of their conversations in the studio, and the recording will feature a vibration sound effect to make it sound as though that Kate and her mom are exchanging actual texts.
And popular vlogger, actor, and writer Jeffery Self narrates his debut YA novel, Drag Teen, about a high school student who enters a drag competition to win a college scholarship (Scholastic Audio, Apr. 26).
Two Audiobooks Mark Brontë’s Birthday
British biographer Claire Harman’s Charlotte Brontë: A Fiery Heart (Knopf), which has already received an early swell of critical acclaim, and the simultaneously released audio edition narrated by Corrie James (HighBridge) debuted March 1, just prior to the 200th anniversary of Brontë’s birth (Apr. 21). And Audible’s new audiobook version of Jane Eyre, Brontë’s famous novel, will be published April 17, featuring the voice talent of actress Thandie Newton (Crash, The Pursuit of Happyness).
L.A. Theatre Works Raises Curtain on LaBute Audio
A stellar cast including Ari Graynor, Eric McCormack, Jennifer Westfeldt, and Amber Tamblyn recently performed Neil LaBute’s play The Money Shot—the story of two aging Hollywood stars coming to grips with contractual nudity—in front of a live audience at UCLA’s James Bridges Theater, and the recorded performance will be released as an L.A. Theatre Works audio program on April 15.
