Playwrights Horizons Begins 'Three Changes' Ticket Lottery 8/13

Starting August 13 at 10AM, Playwrights Horizons (Tim Sanford, Artistic Director; Leslie Marcus, Managing Director) will be accepting entries for its popular LIVEforFIVE online lottery for $5 tickets to its next production, the World Premiere of THREE CHANGES, a new play by Nicky Silver (Fit to Be Tied at Playwrights Horizons, The Food Chain, Pterodactyls, Raised in Captivity).  A total of 50 tickets will be available via the online lottery.

A ticketing initiative created last season as part of the theater company's Arts Access program, LIVEforFIVE makes $5 tickets available for the first preview performance of each Playwrights Horizons production through a lottery via the company's website (www.playwrightshorizons.org).  The LIVEforFIVE lottery for THREE CHANGES will be for tickets to the first preview on Friday, August 22 at 8PM at Playwrights Horizons' Mainstage Theater (416 West 42nd Street).

Directed by Tony Award nominee Wilson Milam (The Lieutenant of Inishmore), the production will have its official opening on Tuesday, September 16 at 7PM and continue through Sunday, September 28.  The cast of THREE CHANGES features Golden Globe winner and Emmy Award nominee Dylan McDermott ("The Practice," Drama League Award nomination for The Culture Project's production of Eve Ensler's The Treatment, Broadway debut in Biloxi Blues); Emmy Award nominee Maura Tierney (Dr. Abby Lockhart on "ER," Some Girl(s) at MCC); film, television and stage star Scott Cohen (Drunk Enough to Say I Love You? at The Public, Broadway's Losing Louie, "Gilmore Girls," "NYPD Blue," the recent FOX series "The Return of Jezebel James");  Aya Cash (The Pain and the Itch at Playwrights Horizons, From Up Here at MTC); and Brian J. Smith (Good Boys and True at Second Stage, MTC's Come Back, Little Sheba).   

 Details for the LIVEforFIVE lottery are as follows: beginning Wednesday, August 13 at 10AM, theatergoers can enter the lottery by filling out an entry form at www.playwrightshorizons.org. Entries will be accepted until Monday, August 18 at 12 Noon.  Winners of the lottery will be notified via email by Tuesday, August 19 at 12 Noon with instructions on how to book their $5 tickets.  One or two tickets may be purchased for $5 each.  At least 50 tickets will be available for Mainstage shows via the lottery.

 In THREE CHANGES, Nate (Dylan McDermott) and Laurel (Maura Tierney) are a comfortably married, Upper West Side couple – until Nate's wayward brother Hal (Scott Cohen) arrives from Hollywood.  What at first seems a casual visit, a chance to reconnect, is quickly revealed as something more ominous.  Hal may have had success, but human connection is all that matters, and he intends to make connections – no matter who pays the price.  Nicky Silver's THREE CHANGES is a funny and darkly suspenseful look at the joy of family, and how far we'll go to get it.

The Arts Access program at Playwrights Horizons allows the institution to reach out to those who may not be able to afford the cost of a full-price theater ticket.

Reflecting PLAYWRIGHTS HORIZONS' ongoing commitment to making its productions more affordable to younger audiences, the theater company will offer HOTtix, $20 rush tickets, subject to availability, day of performance only, starting one hour before showtime to patrons aged 30 and under. Proof of age required. One ticket per person, per purchase. STUDENT RUSH, $15 rush tickets, subject to availability, day of performance only, starting one hour before curtain to full-time graduate and undergraduate students. One ticket per person, per purchase. Valid student ID required.

LIVEforFIVE, HOTtix and STUDENT RUSH are some of Playwrights Horizons' popular Arts Access initiatives, which allow the theater company to reach out to those who may not be able to afford the cost of a full-price theater ticket.  Playwrights Horizons is grateful to Goldman, Sachs & Co., lead sponsor of Arts Access at Playwrights Horizons.  This program is also supported, in part, by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs.

Playwrights Horizons' 2008/2009 Season is generously supported by The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust.

 Playwrights Horizons is supported in part by public funds from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, the New York State Assembly and the New York State Senate.  In addition, Playwrights Horizons receives major support from Carnegie Corporation of New York, The Charina Endowment Fund, The Peter Jay Sharp Foundation, The Shubert Foundation and Time Warner Inc.

Playwrights Horizons, under the leadership of Artistic Director Tim Sanford and Managing Director Leslie Marcus, is a writer's theater dedicated to the support and development of contemporary American playwrights, composers and lyricists, and to the production of their new work.  In its 38 years, Playwrights Horizons has presented the work of more than 375 writers and has received numerous awards and honors, most recently being honored with a special 2008 Drama Desk Award for "ongoing support to generations of theater artists and undiminished commitment to producing new work."  Notable productions include four Pulitzer Prize winners: Doug Wright's I Am My Own Wife (2004 Tony Award, Best Play), Wendy Wasserstein's The Heidi Chronicles (1989 Tony Award, Best Play), Alfred Uhry's Driving Miss Daisy and Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine's Sunday in the Park with George, as well as John Dempsey, Michael Friedman and Rinne Groff's Saved, Sarah Ruhl's Dead Man's Cell Phone, Doug Wright, Scott Frankel and Michael Korie's Grey Gardens (2006 Outer Critics Circle Award, Outstanding Off-Broadway Musical), Bruce Norris's The Pain and the Itch, Lynn Nottage's Fabulation (2005 Obie Award for Playwriting), Craig Lucas's Small Tragedy (2004 Obie Award, Best American Play), Kenneth Lonergan's Lobby Hero, Kirsten Childs's The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin, Richard Nelson and Shaun Davey's James Joyce's The Dead, William Finn's March of the Falsettos and Falsettoland, Christopher Durang's Betty's Summer Vacation and Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You, Richard Nelson's Goodnight Children Everywhere and Franny's Way, Jon Robin Baitz's The Substance of Fire, Scott McPherson's Marvin's Room, A.R. Gurney's Later Life, Adam Guettel and Tina Landau's Floyd Collins and Jeanine Tesori and Brian Crawley's Violet.