Gifted actress, writer’s new book pens letters to the men in her life

Actress Mary-Louise Parker hardly can believe she'll be seen as a writer when she arrives today in Iowa City.

'To me, (Iowa City) that's where all the real writers and poets are,' she said. 'Whenever someone said they went to Iowa, it's so immediately impressive to me. People who really love books and poetry, they know that's a certain pedigree and it stands for something. I didn't really have that kind of education at all. So it feels almost audacious for me to come there with a book. In some ways, it's daunting, and in some ways, I am really excited to even just be in that environment because I love being around writers and talking about books.'

Tonight, Parker will be at the Englert Theatre to read from and talk about her debut book, 'Dear Mr. You.' A series of letters to real and fictional men, the book explores and offers gratitude for the various male influences on Parker's life.

'I tried to write something positive,' she said of 'Dear Mr. You.' 'I am not a wildly educated person, and I haven't had a lot of training as a writer. But I wanted to write something that was about gratitude and sort of a positive rumination on the (male) gender in general.

'I've known a lot of heroic men in my life, starting and ending with my father, and I just wanted to write something that was grateful and wasn't salacious and mean-spirited.'

The letter format seemed to come naturally, she said.

'I liked the creativity that came with the format of letters. It felt very freeing to me.'

Best known for her roles on screen and stage — some of which have garnered her a Tony, a Golden Globe and an Emmy award — Parker said writing this book was a happier creative process for her than acting.

'Writing is a product of thinking so it felt like I was being more validated for myself,' she said. 'There's more a reticence that comes with acting and more of a self-protective thing because I can be shut down so easily or thrown off so easily.

'There's a lot of preparation and a lot of getting into a certain head space, and I end up retreating a lot.

'Writing feels a little bit happier. I am a shy person by nature anyway. But I feel less so surrounding the writing. It brings me out a little bit. I don't know why because it seems like it should be the other way around.'

While this is Parker's first book, the actress has been writing for various publications, including Esquire, which is where the book was conceived.

'I was writing for Esquire and there aren't as many pages being given out, and there are far more significant writers than myself at Esquire,' she said. 'I just wanted more to write, to write something bigger. There was this one piece I had written for Esquire that felt like the beginning of something, and I really loved writing it. When I wrote it, it came out as a letter for some reason. And it is now the innovation at the beginning of the book.'

Parker is more ambiguous about the reasons for publishing it now.

'When you get to the end of the book you'll know why I wanted to write a book,' she said.

The letters in the book were sparked by various, somewhat random memories, Parker said.

'I would just remember a moment or have an inspiration, or a memory would just come back to me,' she said. 'It was most effective for me when I remembered specific moments and built around them. They didn't really come in any order, no order whatsoever actually.'

Parker also says she didn't feel as if she was writing about herself throughout the process, noting that if it truly were autobiographical there would be holes where massive chapters of her life — such as her acting career — aren't touched on.

'It was only when it was done that I was encouraged to put it more in a chronological order according to my life, which I think I resisted in some sense,' she said. 'But it didn't really make any sense in another order. These were the moments I was inspired to write about, and I was inspired by these men.'

Book reading

What: Mary-Louise Parker

When: 7 p.m. Sunday

Where: Englert Theatre, 221 E. Washington St., Iowa City

Cost: $35, includes a copy of the book