Neil Patrick Harris, Stacey Keach, et al. Set for Ojai Playwrights Conference Benefit, 3/26

The Ojai Playwrights Conference launches its 14th season with its annual Benefit Gala themed "Substance of Desire" - a celebration of love, lust and laughter in the plays of Jon Robin Baitz. Scheduled for Saturday, March 26, 2011, the Benefit begins at 5:30 pm at Matilija Auditorium with a dramatic event created especially for this evening. The all- star cast includes David Burtka, Neil Patrick Harris (How I Met your Mother), Jane Kaczmarek (Malcolm in the Middle), Stacy Keach (Lights Out), Ron Rifkin (Brothers & Sisters), Steven Weber (Wings), Noah Wyle (ER) and others to be announced. Following the show, the festivities continue at St. Thomas Aquinas Hall with music, martinis, a gourmet dinner prepared by celebrity chef Michael Hollingsworth, the 2011 OPC Awards, and a live auction featuring fabulous trips and entertainment packages.

Baitz will be honored with the 2011 OPC Award for his contribution to American theatre. His newest play, Other Desert Cities, was read for the first time in Ojai at the 2010 Summer New Works Festival and recently opened at the Lincoln Center in New York City. Baitz has created The Substance of Fire, The Paris Letters, Ten Unknowns and A Fair Country. He is the recipient of a Rockefeller Foundation Award, a Drama Desk Award, is a Guggenheim Fellow, and a Pulitzer Prize finalist for A Fair Country. Baitz also created the hit TV series, Brothers & Sisters.

This original evening of theatre was inspired by OPC Artistic Director/Producer Robert Egan and will be co-directed by Egan along with OPC Associate Artist Michael Morris. Egan has a history of bringing together major talent in Ojai for once-in-a-lifetime performances like this. Past OPC Benefits have featured Sally Field, Dana Delany, Dick Van Dyke, Sandra Oh, David Hyde Pierce and Zachary Quinto to name a few.

"The OPC has become one of the most acclaimed new play development programs in the country, and these amazing stars want to support our efforts," notes Egan. "We raise a large percentage of our operating budget at this event and most of it goes to care and feeding of our many playwrights and actors who come to Ojai in the summer months."

Ticket options for the Benefit are $85 for the Show only; $225 for the Show, Dinner and Auction; and $2,000 the VIP Package for eight which includes preferred seating and a group photo with the cast. Tickets may be ordered online at www.ojaiplays.org. This event will sell out, so early ticket orders are encouraged.

Proceeds from the Benefit will benefit the Ojai Playwrights Conference, a non-profit organization whose mission is to develop unproduced plays of artistic excellence from diverse writers both emerging and established by promoting creative freedom and bold experimentation through a development process that values writers who focus on the compelling social, political and cultural issues of our time, and to nurture a new generation of playwrights through youth workshops. Each summer, playwrights from around the world converge in Ojai for a two-week, intensive in-residence workshop of their plays that culminates in public readings. The 14th Annual OPC Summer New Works Festival will take place August 9-14, 2011

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