Adriana Trigiani

Adriana Trigiani
Born	Big Stone Gap, Virginia
Ethnicity	Italian American
Education	B.A., Saint Mary's College, Indiana, USA
Occupation	novelist, television writer, producer, film director
Website	www.adrianatrigiani.com

Adriana Trigiani is an Italian American best-selling author of sixteen books, television writer, film director, and entrepreneur based in Greenwich Village, New York City. Trigiani has published a novel a year since 2000.

Early life and career

Inspired by her Italian American heritage and Appalachian childhood in Big Stone Gap, Virginia, Trigiani arrived in New York in 1985 after attending Saint Mary's College in Indiana. Trigiani made her off-Broadway debut in New York City as a playwright in 1985 at the Manhattan Theater Club with Secrets of the Lava Lamp, directed by Stuart Ross. From 1988-98, she created scripts for television sitcoms, including The Cosby Show (1984) and its spin-off A Different World (1987). She was writer and executive producer of City Kids for ABC/Jim Henson Productions, and she oversaw Growing Up Funny, a television special for Lifetime, and Linc's, a Showtime comedy series. Trigiani has written best-selling novels, screenplays, and two memoirs, and she has written and directed documentaries and a major motion picture. Trigiani co-founded The Origin Project, a writing education program for school children.

Novelist, film maker

Trigiani authored the best-selling Big Stone Gap series, including Big Stone Gap (2000), Big Cherry Holler (2001), Milk Glass Moon (2002), and Home to Big Stone Gap (2006), set in her Virginia hometown; and the bestselling Valentine trilogy, the tale of a woman working to save her family's shoe company in Greenwich Village. Trigiani also wrote the Viola books, about a clever teenage filmmaker from Brooklyn, for young adults. Trigiani's acclaimed stand-alone novels include Lucia, Lucia (2003), The Queen of the Big Time (2004), and Rococo (2005). Trigiani's book The Shoemaker's Wife is the fictional account of the lives of her own grandparents after emigrating to America from Italy in the early 20th century. Regularly on the New York Times Bestsellers list, critics have noted Trigiani's ability to "create distinctive voices for each of her characters." Millions of copies of Trigiani's books are in print in the United States and published in 36 countries around the world. Overlapping themes include self-perception, social identity, the universal immigrant story, personal loss, working class life, and contemporary social and environmental issues. Since 2012, Adriana Trigiani Tours, and AT Escapes, have offered travel tours to Italy, Scotland, Spain and Gibraltar inspired by the novels of Adriana Trigiani.

During the 1990s, Trigiani wrote and directed an award winning documentary Queen of The Big Time (1996), the story of her father’s hometown of Roseto, Pennsylvania, shown in film festivals in London and Hong Kong, co-produced Green Chimneys, and later contributed to PBS documentary The Italian Americans. In 2014, Trigiani directed the major motion picture Big Stone Gap (film), a romantic comedy film adaptation of her namesake bestselling novel, produced by Donna Gigliotti for Altar Identity Studios, a subsidiary of Media Society. Big Stone Gap (film) is a story of family secrets and self-discovery in an Appalachian coal-mining town of the late 1970's. The award-winning ensemble cast includes Ashley Judd, Whoopi Goldberg, Jane Krakowski, Jenna Elfman, and Patrick Wilson. Released on October 9, 2015 by Picturehouse (company), Trigiani's narrative directorial debut arrived nearly 30-year after the sale of her first screenplay, Three to Get Married, produced by Kate Benton in 1986. Opening the Virginia Film Festival, Big Stone Gap (film) was ranked among the top 250 grossing women directed films of 2014.

Media appearances

Trigiani and her work have regularly been featured on NBC's Today Show, CBS This Morning, WNYC’s The Leonard Lopate Show, and the Diane Rehm Show on National Public Radio. Trigiani's community service works include guest speaker at New York University and the New School for Social Research, commencement speaker at University of Virginia at Wise, and University of New Haven, Connecticut, and for 10 years, host of the Library of Virginia Literary Awards, and also the Poets and Writers Gala of New York City, The Audio Publishers Association Audies Gala, the Barnes & Noble Writers for Writers Awards, and co-host of the Arizona Women's Board Annual Authors Luncheon.

Novels

• Big Stone Gap: a novel. New York: Random House, 2000.
• Big Cherry Holler: a Big Stone Gap novel. New York: Random House, 2001
• Milk Glass Moon : a Big Stone Gap novel. New York: Random House, 2002.
• Lucia, Lucia: a novel. New York: Random House, 2004.
• Home to Big Stone Gap; a novel. New York: Random House, 2006.
• The Queen of the Big Time : a novel. New York: Random House, 2004.
• Rococo: a novel. New York: Random House, 2005.
• Very Valentine: a novel. New York: Random House, 2009.
• Viola in reel life. New York: Harper Teen, 2009.
• Brava, Valentine: a novel. Harper Collins Publishers, 2010
• Viola In the Spotlight New York: Harper Teen, 2011.
• The Shoemaker's Wife: a novel.New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 2012.
• The Supreme Macaroni Company : a novel. New York : Harper Collins Publishers, 2013.
• All The Stars in the Heavens : a novel. New York: Harper, Harper Collins Publishers, 2015.

Memoirs

• Cooking With My Sisters : One Hundred Years of Family Recipes from Bari to Big Stone Gap. New York: Random House, 2004.
• Don't Sing At The Table : Life Lessons From My Grandmothers New York : Harper, 2010.

Professional recognition

• 1996: Audience Award, Queens of the Big Time. Hamptons International Film Festival & Palm Springs International Film Festival.
• 2003: New York Times Bestsellers, Lucia, Lucia: a novel.
• 2004: New York Times Bestsellers, The Queen of the Big Time: a novel.
• 2004: Best Read in England &Publishers Weekly Best Sellers, Lucia, Lucia: a novel.
• 2005: Publishers Weekly Fiction Award, finalist & "New York Times Bestsellers, Rococo: a novel.
• 2006: Library of Virginia Annual Literary Awards, Big Stone Gap: a novel.
• 2006: People’s Choice Award Finalist, Big Stone Gap.
• 2007: Library of Virginia Annual Literary Awards, Home to Big Stone Gap.
• 2008: Shepherd University Foundation, The West Virginia Humanities Council, and The West Virginia Center for the Book, Appalachian Heritage Writer’s Award.
• 2009: New York Times Bestsellers, Very Valentine: a novel
• 2010: New York Times Bestsellers, Brava Valentine: a novel.
• 2010: American Library Association Reading List selection, Very valentine.
• 2012: Publishers Weekly Best Seller & New York Times Bestsellers: The Shoemaker's Wife: a novel
• 2013: Publishers Weekly Best Seller, The Supreme Macaroni Company: a novel.
• 2013: The National Organization of Italian American Women, Connecticut Region, honoree Adriana Trigiani
• 2015: Best Ensemble Cast, Big Stone Gap, the movie. Bentonville Film Festival Award.
• 2015: The New York Times, Barnes & Noble, USA Today, and Publishers Weekly Best Sellers, All The Stars In the Heaven.
• 2015: Seattle International Film Festival Women In Cinema series, Big Stone Gap (film).

External links

• Official website
• Adriana Trigiani at the Internet Movie Database