American dramatist
Del Shores |
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| Occupation(s) | Playwright, Director, Activist |
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| Website | delshores.com |
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Delferd Lynn Shores (born December 3, 1957) is an American film director, television writer, producer, playwright, standup comedian, and actor. He has written, directed and produced across studio and independent film, network and cable television and Los Angeles, regional and national touring theatre. He is also known for his LGBTQ+ activism. Shores was born in Winters, TX, the son of a Southern Baptist pastor and a high school drama teacher. [1]
Biography
The first play Shores wrote was Cheatin' which premiered in 1984 in Los Angeles at The MainStage Theatre. He was 26 at the time and also starred in the play as "Clarence Hopkins". He reprised his role at Tiffany's Attic in Kansas City, MO in 1985, where he co-starred with Leslie Jordan, beginning a long professional and close friendship.
His second play Daddy's Dyin' (Who's Got the Will?) saw a 1987 premiere in Los Angeles at Theatre/Theater, running twenty-two months. A movie version by the same name was released in 1990 by MGM starring Beau Bridges, Tess Harper, Judge Reinhold, Keith Carradine, Patrika Darbo and Beverly D'Angelo. Shores wrote the screenplay and executive produced the film. As a result of the play's success, he signed a television deal at Warner Brothers and developed television there for four years.
Perhaps Shores' best-known play is his fourth, Sordid Lives, premiered at Theatre/Theater in 1996 in Los Angeles. The comedy centered on the Texan Ingram family and touched on LGBT themes. F. Kathleen Foley of The LA Times wrote in her review: "Del Shores' "Sordid Lives" at Theatre/Theater has more laughs than a hunting dog has ticks…. proving himself a master of the Texas comedy."[2]
In 1999 Shores wrote and directed the screen version of Sordid Lives starring Beau Bridges, Delta Burke, Olivia Newton-John, Bonnie Bedelia, Leslie Jordan and Beth Grant along with most of the cast from the play. The movie became a cult phenomenon and holds the record as the longest-running film in the history of Palm Springs, running ninety-six weeks at The Camelot Theatre.[3]
Shores' play Southern Baptist Sissies enjoyed a ten-month sold-out run at the Zephyr Theatre in Los Angeles in 2000. Revived in 2002, Sissies had another six-month sold-out run.[4] In 2003, The Trials and Tribulations of a Trailer Trash Housewife became Shores' most critically acclaimed play ran for a six-month sold-out run at the Zephyr Theatre in Los Angeles.[5]
In 2006, Shores revived three of his plays (Sordid Lives, Southern Baptist Sissies, The Trials and Tribulations of a Trailer Trash Housewife) at the Zephyr Theatre in Los Angeles before taking to the road for a successful six-city national tour, starring Dale Dickey, Delta Burke and Leslie Jordan.
In 2008, Shores created, wrote, directed and executive produced 12 prequel episodes of Sordid Lives: The Series which aired on American LGBT-interest cable channel Logo starring Olivia Newton-John, Bonnie Bedelia, Rue McClanahan, Leslie Jordan, Beth Grant, Dale Dickey, Caroline Rhea along with many of the original stage and film cast. The series also featured cameos by Carson Kressley, Candis Cayne and Margaret Cho.
In 2009, Shores returned to the stage as an actor and played 34 cities to sold-out houses with his one-man show Del Shores: My Sordid Life. The DVD was filmed and released in 2012 by Breaking Glass Pictures.
The world premiere of Shores' play, Yellow, opened June 11, 2010 at The Coast Playhouse in West Hollywood, CA to rave reviews and ran for six sold-out months.
Shores wrote, directed and produced the film version of his play The Trials and Tribulations of a Trailer Trash Housewife with the entire original stage cast: Beth Grant, Octavia Spencer, Dale Dickey, David Steen and Debby Holiday. The film adaption is entitled Blues For Willadean and was released in select theatres in late 2012, distributed by Breaking Glass Pictures.
In the summer of 2011, Shores returned to the road, selling out his new stand-up tour of Del Shores: Sordid Confessions. He returned to his home state of Texas in January 2012 to film the show at the famous Rose Room in Dallas. Breaking Glass Pictures released the DVD to positive reviews. His stand-up career continued with his third national tour in 2012 with Del Shores: Naked.Sordid.Reality, also filmed at The Rose Room and distributed by Breaking Glass Pictures.
Shores film of his play Southern Baptist Sissies played the film festival circuit in 2013 and won ten major awards, including many for Shores' writing and directing. The film stars Emerson Collins, Willam Belli, Matthew Scott Montgomery, Luke Stratte-McClure, Newell Alexander, Rosemary Alexander, Bobbie Eakes, Ann Walker, Dale Dickey and Leslie Jordan.
Shores' final chapter of his Sordid Lives franchise – A Very Sordid Wedding gained rave reviews and sold out in selected cities where it opened. It was Gravitas Ventures #1 selling title of 2017 and was Amazon's #1 LGBT title for fifteen weeks. The film stars many of the Sordid veterans including Bonnie Bedelia, Leslie Jordan, Caroline Rhea, Dale Dickey and Ann Walker with appearances by Whoopi Goldberg, Levi Kreis, Alec Mapa, Katherine Bailess, Carole Cook and Alec Paunovic. The story advances the Sordid Lives characters seventeen years. The film had its world premiere in Palm Springs on March 10, 2017.
In 2018, Shores returned to the stage, performing his new one-man play Six Characters In Search Of A Play and toured the country to rave reviews. The play was filmed at The Celebration Theatre in Hollywood, CA and is distributed by Breaking Glass.
Other stand-up tours: Del Shores: SINgularly SORDID (2015) and Del Shores: The Shit Stirrer (2019).
In 2019, Shores ninth play This Side of Crazy premiered at The New Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco, then opened at The Zephyr Theatre in Los Angeles in 2019. Shores directed both productions.
In 2020, Shores adapted his film A Very Sordid Wedding for the stage. His tenth play premiered at The Kalita Humphreys Theater for Uptown Players in Dallas, Texas. Shores directed. Also, in 2020, Shores was commissioned to write and direct his eleventh play In Memoriam of Lena for Northwestern State University, Louisiana, where he is a yearly guest artist for the theatre department.[6]
In 2023, Shores directed the first play he did not write. Jiggs Burgess' The Red Suitcase had its world premiere at The Broadwater Stage in Hollywood, CA as a recipient of the top award at the inaugural Del Shores Foundation Writer's Conference. Assistant directed and additional staging by Blake McIver Ewing, produced by P3 Theatre Company.
Personal life
Shores, the son of a Southern Baptist preacher and high school drama teacher, grew up in Winters, Brownwood and Zapata, Texas,
He attended Zapata High School, graduating 4th in his class.
He has a BA in Journalism/Spanish from Baylor University.
Prior to coming out as gay in 1995 (in an LA Times article during the run of his play Sordid Lives, Shores was married to Kelley Alexander. They have two daughters, Caroline Shores-Thrush and Rebecca Shores.[7]
Shores is the president of The Del Shores Foundation with the mission to find and facilitate the development of new southern queer artistic voices through bringing together artists and working professionals, amplifying new work and connecting artists to platforms for the creation of the work. Yearly, the foundation has a writer's search.[8]
