How to Talk to Famous People

Born in rural Oklahoma and later traveling west to the multi-cultural environs of the California Bay Area, Marianne Gage encounters a profusion of notable personalities: a famous cartoonist, an art professor, several well-known actors (including one musical comedy star), a presidential candidate, a young black revolutionary, a celebrated blind pianist, a jazz musician, and many more. Some of these meetings are pleasant and friendly; others are blundering and gauche. But they all add up to a lifetime of noteworthy experiences spanning the 20th century and leading into the 21st. In the final chapter, Gage and her husband host a fantasy party with all the luminaries in attendance, both living and dead. Noel Coward meets Huey Newton, Maria Tallchief gets to know Mercedes Ruehl, and a good time is had by all. * * *Marianne Gage has published The Wind Came Running, The Putneyville Fables, All Kinds of Beauty, and The Quirky Kids of Sunshine Hollow. Gage, a former teacher in the Oakland public schools, is a portrait artist and printmaker. She was married for sixty-eight years to San Francisco illustrator Ed Diffenderfer.