Meet Susan Hayden | Author & Creator/Producer of Library Girl

We had the good fortune of connecting with Susan Hayden and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Susan, why did you pursue a creative career?
It all started with my father, a Century City attorney who, in his youth, idolized Hemingway and had longed to be a writer. He was an artist at his core but chose the conventional route because he thrived on structure and wanted to provide stability for his family. Growing up, I at once witnessed his dedication to his work and yet his dissatisfaction with the path he had chosen. And then, in his 50s, he was bequeathed an endowment to create a foundation and school for the performing arts in Carmel Valley with a focus on children’s musical theatre. Adventures ensued, including a cultural exchange with kids from Russia, who were brought out here to perform with the young participants from his school. He produced the musical Peace Child (inspired by Bernard Benson’s Peace Book and composed by David Gordon, brother of Yusuf/Cat Stevens). The premise: “Peace begins with the children.” My father truly came alive during that time. But he never emerged as an artist or a writer himself.
His years of career-unhappiness before he founded The Frohman Academy shaped and informed my choice to follow my own instincts, which were always directed away from business and veering toward the arts. My father couldn’t help but be supportive of my creative life, first as an aspiring actress and then as a writer. I think he got a vicarious thrill watching me step into the unknown and becoming, at a young age, a part of the theatre and poetry communities. He died nearly thirty years ago. I believe I’ve fulfilled a longing that was unresolved in him and in doing so, it’s grown my life in all the best ways.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?

Every creative choice I’ve made in my life that didn’t work out led to something that did. When I began to understand that acting was clearly not my path, I focused on my writing and never looked back. Worlds opened for me. I’m a multigenre writer. I write poems, stories, plays, personal essays and micro-memoir.

My first husband, Christopher Allport, was an actor, writer and musician. He and I collaborated on several projects over nearly two decades, including a well-received performance-fiction series, the first of its kind in LA, called Gas/Food/Lodging at the Lost Studio in Hollywood. We also received a grant to create a theatre piece at South Coast Rep through their Nexus Project. And I produced his one-man show, The Backroad Home, at the Ruskin Group Theatre in Santa Monica.
Then, in 2008, he died tragically in a ski accident and I became an only parent to our then-11 year old son, Mason. We were both in shock and shattered, to say the least. I felt, for a time, like I had no more plans, like the future was a barren landscape. All I cared about was making sure Mason was stable. My life’s work was to create a safe place for him, ensure his well-being.

And then at some point, it occurred to me that the only way for us both to get through the sadness was to start recognizing the joy that could still be found. That’s around the time my literary series Library Girl was born. I took every artistic skill I had and threw it into making a show once a month. It has not only helped anchor my life but it has rebuilt it. I fill those evenings with a diverse group of bold writers and exceptional musicians who share their work with a listening audience. I present nearly all forms of writing.

Mason, who’d learned his first chords of guitar from his father, had turned to music to help heal him. He would open every show with a couple of songs, from the age of twelve in 2009 all the way to 2022, when he and his partner, Irene Greene, formed their music duo, The Prickly Pair, and moved to Nashville to pursue their careers.

I am now in my 15th year of creating, curating and producing Library Girl. I love bringing artists together and building community. And I regularly celebrate the small presses of Los Angeles at my show. I have presented Punk Hostage Press, Cahuenga Press, Santa Monica Review, Perceval Press, Rare Bird Books and Padua Playwrights Press, to name a few. One night, I invited poet-publisher Eric Morago to bring writers from his Moon Tide Press to come read. The next day, he called to thank me and asked what I was working on. I’d had a book in the works for years. You could say I’d been writing that book my whole life. But I only had the skeleton of a draft to share with him and when he read it he said, “Yes. I want to publish the completed manuscript.”

And he did! Now You Are a Missing Person (Moon Tide Press, 2023) is a genre-bending memoir about love and grief and emerging into healing. It was inspired by three key losses (my father, my childhood best friend and my first husband).

I didn’t realize, when I set out to launch the book, that many LA bookstores weren’t interested in supporting publications by small presses, wouldn’t carry my book in their store or book me for a reading because I wasn’t a name, wasn’t endorsed by a mainstream press. It was a startling beginning. I was devastated. So I “broke protocol” and took to writing about it on Facebook, raising the question: “Why aren’t the writers from small presses honored in the same way as writers from mainstream presses?” And I asked for help, suggestions, direction.

Everyone came to my aid. Writer-friends and strangers too, shared their own stories, informed me of the LA bookstores that do care about local authors from small presses (Book Soup, Village Well, Barnes & Noble at The Grove, Stories Books among them) and I felt held up by this glorious community I have been a part of for decades.

I was not used to being the one asking for help. But as much as it made me uncomfortable, it was necessary. It was essential. And it was the best thing I did to give my book a real chance.
Writing and releasing this book has turned out to be an unexpected, healing act. What means the most is when I hear from people who tell me my words have touched their lives, helped them give voice to their own grief.

And, since 2019, I have been joyfully remarried to Steve Hochman, who is also a writer. He fills my life every day with his inimitable wit and lovingkindness. He too was widowed and we both share that permanent record of having loved someone else we’d thought would be in our lives for the duration. We have much to share, much to look forward to. Our losses pull us into presence. And that in itself is a rare gift.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?

I grew up in LA (well, the Valley) and have lived in Santa Monica since 1990. I’ve never lived anywhere else, never left this city.

Since the 1970s, I’ve watched my favorite restaurants and structures be torn down. The disappearing landscape (both external and internal) is the underlying theme of my book. My first losses were old buildings. It has imbued in me a nostalgia for what was and I treasure the architecture and relics of what remains.

Every year on my birthday, Steve and I drive to a home of architectural note that is tied to a movie or TV show. That first year we were together, I had him take me by the Villa Primavera, the 1923 Spanish revival apartments in West Hollywood where Nicolas Ray once lived. This was the building that inspired the interior-courtyard complex known at the Beverly Patio Apartments in Ray’s brilliant film, In A Lonely Place (1950). On another birthday, I asked Steve to take me to the Triangle House in Tarzana where the movie Breezy (1973) was shot. It’s a stunning, mid-century Gesner, with glass walls and a sunken deck. And during the pandemic on my birthday, we drove to the hills above Sunset Plaza to gaze at another masterpiece, Harry Bosch’s stilt house from the TV show “Bosch.”

I would share this architectural tour with any visiting friend. And then, we’d go on a red booth tour of some of my favorite restaurants: Musso & Frank, Dan Tana’s, The Tam O’Shanter, Little Dom’s. And to liven things up, we’d hit Louisiana-inspired The Little Jewel of New Orleans and Stevie’s Creole Café.

What excites me most are live events. You can’t go wrong on any night at Beyond Baroque in Venice to hear great poets reading from their work, or the Ruskin Group Theatre for Library Girl (of course!) on the 2nd Sunday night of the month and on the 3rd Sunday night of the month, Café Plays for speed-theatre. And McCabe’s, where some of our best singer-songwriters perform. Monday nights are reserved for the Cinema Bar in Culver City, where Hot Club of Los Angeles performs Django-jazz.

And finally, I’d be more than willing to head back to my hometown of Encino to give my personal “Borrowing Sugar” Tour which would include driving by the former homes of Leon Russell and Tom Petty, where, as a child, I was once escorted off their properties with an empty measuring cup. Then, to thoroughly taste my childhood, we’d head to Uncle Bernie’s Delicatessen, order some black and white cookies and wash them down with a couple of egg creams.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?

In the mid-80s, before I had enough courage to read from my poems and stories around town, I happened upon the poetry of actor Harry Northup, whose natural, unforced, beautiful language washed over me, completely pulled me in. Through a listing in LA Weekly, I found that he was doing a reading at Beyond Baroque in Venice. I showed up, introduced myself, told him I was just starting out and needed guidance. He gave me my first co-featured reading (with Eric Trules) at a series he was producing at Gasoline Alley on Melrose. And he introduced me to his partner and great love, poet Holly Prado (RIP), who taught writing workshops in their East Hollywood apartment and would later become my teacher. After that, I landed at Poetry In Motion, Eve Brandstein’s and Michael Lally’s spectacular weekly event where I was a regular participant. That show became the highlight of every week.

I dedicate my shoutout to my first poet-friend, Harry Northup and am deeply grateful to Holly Prado, Eve Brandstein and Michael Lally for the early, warm welcome they all gave me. And I am indebted to two of my closest friends, poets S.A. Griffin and Michael C Ford, whom I met in 1989. They were my spirit animals back then―and still are, as I’ve remained committed to the literary arts of Los Angeles and they have been my constant guides.

And then there is my Ruskin Group Theatre family. After my first husband Chris died, the Ruskin became my second home when I was invited by Mike Myers and John Ruskin to create and produce a monthly show there. I’m not sure what I would have happened if they hadn’t asked, if I hadn’t been given the opportunity to create Library Girl, which has given meaning to my life in immeasurable ways and has given me the chance, every month, to encourage and mentor other writers.

Website: susanhayden.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/librarygirlpresents/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/susanelizabethhayden

Other: ruskingrouptheatre.com

Image Credits
#1: Me at Shakespeare & Co. Photo by Steve Hochman #2: Me. Photo by Alexis Rhone Fancher. #3: Book Cover of Now You Are a Missing Person. Cover Art by Hazel Angell. #4: Library Girl Presents: Whisper Your Mother’s Name. Photo by Steve Hochman. (From left: Tanya White, Karen Croner, Rick Bursky, Me, Tommy Swerdlow, Jane Rosenberg LaForge, Amelia Mulkey Anderson, Dan Navarro). Photo by Steve Hochman. #5: Library Girl Logo by Amelia Mulkey. #6: Book Soup Poster of my reading there created by Book Soup. Author Photo: Alexis Rhone Fancher. #7: Me and the Boys (Richard Modiano, Michael C Ford, Me, John McDuffie, Steve Hochman). Photo by Jill Jarrett.