Symphony Space on NYC's Upper West Side Hosted Selected Shorts With Viet Thanh Nguyen

On Wednesday, October 21 at 7pm, Symphony Space on the Upper West Side hosted Selected Shorts: The Best American Short Stories 2026 with Viet Thanh Nguyen in the Peter Jay Sharp Theatre.

Nguyen, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Sympathizer, served as guest editor of The Best American Short Stories 2026 and hosted the evening. It is the venue's annual collaboration with the anthology, which Symphony Space describes as one of the premier collections of contemporary American fiction. The format pairs stories from established and emerging writers with actors who perform them live.

The program included stories by Nathan Blum, Sigrid Nunez and Akhil Sharma. The readers were Sanjit De Silva (War Horse, Inventing Anna), Jessica Hecht (Breaking Bad, Eureka Day) and Denis O'Hare (American Horror Story, Here We Are). The expected running time was 105 minutes, with no intermission.

Tickets ran from $19 to $43, with a $5 service fee on every ticket. Both in-person and livestream options were offered. The Skint, a free-and-cheap events newsletter, ran a sponsored listing with a $16 Tier 2 code for its readers.

Selected Shorts is also recorded for national public radio, so the audience becomes part of the broadcast and podcast. Stories can be heard again on local public radio stations or the Selected Shorts podcast.

Symphony Space is at 2537 Broadway at 95th Street. It is a non-profit performing arts organization, and it says ticket sales cover less than 25% of its costs. The next Selected Shorts evenings on its calendar are The Most of Nora Ephron, hosted by Meg Wolitzer, on November 18, and Objects with Roz Chast on December 9.