Special Series Pavilion Passes

Join us for a special series of afternoon Pavilion Talks July 19-21

This year, in place of our single event tickets, we have a new offering—Special Series Pavilion Passes! You can join us in the Sun Valley Pavilion for a series of three afternoon Pavilion Talks each day on July 20 & 21 ($150 per day) and for one very special talk on July 19 ($50). View the line-up of speakers below. Passes will be on sale June 2 directly from this page. Stay tuned for more information by subscribing to our email newsletter!

PASSES ON SALE HERE JUNE 2

Pavilion Pass - July 19

Doris Kearns Goodwin

An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s

Saturday, July 19 | 12:30pm – 1:45pm | Sun Valley Pavilion

There is no finer voice to launch our 2025 festival than that of DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN, the revered and respected Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and biographer. Now she has written something thrilling and different: a moving memoir of her long marriage to Richard “Dick” Goodwin, a presidential speechwriter and close adviser to John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, the latter of whom he worked with to develop the Great Society. She will talk about the passion she and Dick shared for each other and for the country, and about the pivotal moments and central figures of the 1960s—the Kennedys, Johnsons, and Martin Luther King Jr.—and tell us what still fills her with hope. Love stories don’t get richer or more meaningful than this.

$50 FOR SINGLE TALK (ON SALE JUNE 2)

Pavilion Pass - July 20

Ocean Vuong

The Emperor of Gladness

Sunday, July 20 | 1:30pm – 2:30pm | Sun Valley Pavilion

In works of piercing beauty and heartrending grace, in poetry and prose, OCEAN VUONG has become one of his generation’s most necessary and unforgettable literary voices. Now, with The Emperor of Gladness, he returns with a bighearted second novel. One summer evening in post-industrial Connecticut, 19-year-old Hai stands on the edge of a bridge in pelting rain, ready to jump, when he hears someone shout across the river. The voice belongs to Grazina, an elderly widow succumbing to dementia, who convinces him to take another path. Bereft and out of options, he quickly becomes her caretaker. Over the course of the year, the unlikely pair develops a life-altering bond. With his singular ability to twin grit with grace through tenderness, Vuong will discuss the novel and his writing with SVWC Literary Director JOHN BURNHAM SCHWARTZ.

Improvised Shakespeare Company

You Have to See It to Believe It

Sunday, July 20 | 3:00pm – 4:00pm | Sun Valley Pavilion

Now for some wit and joy and literary-inspired belly laughs. They come courtesy of the one-and-only IMPROVISED SHAKESPEARE COMPANY, a performing troupe that will put on a never-before-seen and never-to-be-been-again fully improvised Shakespearean masterpiece. Based on an audience suggestion for a title of the show, founder BLAINE SWEN and his merry band, ROSS BRYANT, BRENDAN DOWLING, and RANDALL HARR, will create an actual play right before our eyes. Nothing has been planned, rehearsed, or written down. This is improvisational theater at its most dazzling and risky—something to make the Bard himself laugh out loud.

Panel Discussion with Doris Kearns Goodwin, Evan Osnos & Max Boot

Our Transformative Presidents & How They Changed the Office & the Country

Sunday, July 20 | 4:30pm – 5:30pm | Sun Valley Pavilion

A few of the occupants of the highest office in the land have changed the nature and reach of the presidency and therefore the country itself. We have asked two preeminent presidential historians, DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN and MAX BOOT, to reflect upon the impact of transformative presidents and what combination of drive, vision, and charisma informed their White House tenures. Boot is the author of the much-lauded recent biography of President Ronald Reagan, and Goodwin is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and has written books on Presidents Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, and Lyndon Johnson. In conversation with award-winning journalist EVAN OSNOS, the author of a recent presidential biography on Joe Biden, they will offer wise, deeply-informed analyses of our transformative presidents and their lasting legacies.

$150 FOR 3 TALKS (ON SALE JUNE 2)

Pavilion Pass - July 21

Colum McCann

Twist

Monday, July 21 | 1:30pm – 2:30pm | Sun Valley Pavilion

From 9/11 (Let the Great World Spin) to war and peace both in Ireland (TransAtlantic) and Israel/Palestine (Apeirogon), COLUM McCANN has sought ways to channel the biggest stories of our age into resonant, elliptical, poetic works of fiction. His latest novel tells the story of a journalist sent to report on the complex work of repairing underwater cables that carry the world’s information. Dazzling on every level, human and technological, it is McCann at his best, finding beauty and mystery on the front lines of danger. Few novelists pay such close attention to the“stories of our times” as McCann, who will be in conversation with JEFFREY BROWN of the PBS NewsHour.

Vivek H. Murthy, MD

From the Heart

Monday, July 21 | 3:00pm – 4:00pm | Sun Valley Pavilion

During his tenure as the Surgeon General of the United States, VIVEK H. MURTHY, MD became, in effect, our national healer. In a soft but strong voice, he spoke about the country’s maladies like addiction, depression, and violence, and he made the passionate case that loneliness was the contributor to many of those ills, including our over-dependence on social media. That message is at the heart of his book, Together: The Healing Power of Human Connection. In conversation with Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author ANDREA ELLIOTT, Murthy will talk about the book, about his own bouts of loneliness, and how we can each learn to be a healer in our own lives.

Carl Hiaasen

Fever Beach

Monday, July 21 | 4:30pm – 5:30pm | Sun Valley Pavilion

We close the 2025 Sun Valley Writers’ Conference on a note of high hilarity with one of our favorite and funniest authors, CARL HIAASEN, talking about his brand-new novel Fever Beach, another classic based—where else—in his home state of Florida. He will have you from the opening sentence, when a man named Dale Figgo picks up a hitchhiker on Gus Grissom Boulevard in Tangelo Shores, Florida. Their escapades will take them deep into Florida at its most Floridian: a sun-soaked bastion of rightwing extremism, white power, greed, and corruption. Hiaasen is the author of seven novels for young readers and fifteen previous novels for adults, including Bad Monkey, recently adapted into a hit Apple series starring Vince Vaughn, and which, if you haven’t already seen it, you will certainly want to after hearing this talk.

$150 FOR 3 TALKS (ON SALE JUNE 2)