David Henry Sterry

Early life

Sterry's parents were immigrants from Newcastle, England. His paternal grandfather was a coal miner. His maternal grandfather was a professional soccer player, bicyclist, and boxer, as well as a suspected pedophile. grew up in New Jersey; Birmingham, Alabama; Virginia, Minnesota; and Dallas, Texas. He attended boarding school at Darrow School in New Lebanon, NY, went to Immaculate Heart College in Hollywood for one year, where he also was employed as sex worker. This became the subject of his first memoir, Chicken: Self-Portrait of a Young Man for Rent. He then transferred to Reed College, where he studied existentialism and poetry, and graduated in 1978. There he began to publish his poetry, which has appeared in journals such as The Orangutan, and Santa Monica Review. He was a baseball prodigy, and after training in England, was offered a professional soccer contract when he was 21. He has worked as a building inspector, a chicken fryer, a limousine driver, a telephone solicitor, a soccer referee, and a marriage counselor.

Career

He started in show business as a stand-up comedian and improviser in the San Francisco during the comedy boom of the early 1980s, performing at clubs such as the Holy City Zoo, The Other Cafe, and the infamous Sutro Bath House. He opened for acts ranging from Milton Berle to Robin Williams to Dana Carvey. He then became an actor, appearing in small productions, such as Nuts at the Walnut Creek Rep, and Comedians the Red Flag Theater Company. In 1984, he moved to New York, where he appeared in hundreds of commercials, for McDonald's, AT&T, and Levi's, eventually becoming the spokesman for Publisher's Clearing House. He also performed in many Off-Off Broadway plays, such as Story Theater, and Fast Girls, and began writing short plays which he performed at places such as the West Bank Theater, with actors such as John Michael Higgins, and comedians like Louis Black. In 1985 he was hired to be the master of ceremonies at Chippendales, the notorious male stripper show. Nick de Noia, the creator of the show, was assassinated while Sterry was working for him. This would become the subject of his second memoir, Master of Ceremonies: A True Story of Love, Murder, Roller Skates & Chippendales. He was brought to Hollywood to act in the film Memoirs of an Invisible Man, starring Chevy Chase, directed by John Carpenter. He appeared in a pilot for Eddie Murphy's production company. It starred Margaret Cho, and was not picked up by ABC. This led to a string of guest starring roles in black sitcoms like The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Sister Sister, Roc, Minor Adjustmnents, and in HBO's Dream On. He was a regular on the HBO/CTW show Encyclopedia, where he played characters ranging from George Washington to Napoleon Bonaparte to Leif Erikson. He also appeared in what is widely regarded as one of the worst movies ever made, Hellroller. He wrote the movie script Army Dog for Disney, and sold the feature Jackpot to Nickleoden. His script Baby Love was purchased by Goldstreet Pictures. None of these scripts were made.

He began writing books in 2001, with the publication of Satchel Sez: The World, Wit & Wisdom of Leroy Sawtchel Paige (Random House). His next book, the 2002 memoir, Chicken: Self-Portrait of a Young Man for Rent, described by The New York Times as a "studiously wild souvenier", details his experiences as a teenage hustler in 1970s Hollywood. His one-man show, based on his memoir Chicken, debuted internationally at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and was named the #1 show in the UK by the Independent. It was then published by Canongate, and has been translated into ten languages. He has also been published in numerous anthologies, such as San Francisco Noir (Akashic); Creative Non-Fiction; Things 2 Do Before I Die; Five Minute Erotica; Tarnished: True Tales of Innocence Lost.

Sterry is also an activist, a teacher, and a book doctor. He has taught at Stanford University, the University of New Orleans, the University of Amsterdam, and ran a writing workshop for at-risk teenagers and survivors of the sex industry for the United States Department of Justice in Washington DC in 2005. Sterry co-edited the Soft Skull Press anthology Hos, Hookers, Call Girls and Rant Boys: Professionals Writing on Life, Love, Money and Sex, which was featured on the front page of the Sunday New York Times Book Review on August 23, 2009.

He performs the show Sex Worker Literati all over the country. The show consists of people from the sex industry reading and performing their work, and is based on an article which featured him, written by Alex Kuczynski in The New York Times. Sterry is a regular contributor to the Huffington Post. As a result of his book The Glorious World Cup: A Fanatic's Guide, which he co-authored with Alan Black, he is also a regular commentator on NPR.

With the publication of The Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published (Workman, 2010), he co-founded the company The Book Doctors, and developed a show called Pitchapalooza, where writers get one minute to pitch their books ideas to a panel of publishing experts. He has done this show, with his wife Arielle Eckstut, at book stores such as the Strand in NYC, Powell's in Portland OR, Rainy Day Books in Kansas City, and the Miami, Texas and Los Angeles Book Festivals.