National Conservatory of Dramatic Arts to Produce OUR LADY OF SANDWICH, 3/29-4/1

The Baltimore Playwrights Festival (www.baltplayfest.org) is proud to announce that BPF alumni Mario Baldessari and Keith Bridges will receive a full production of their play Our Lady of Sandwich at the National Conservatory of Dramatic Arts (www.theconservatory.org), 1556 Wisconsin Avenue, NW, Washington, DC, 20007, 202-333-2202. Show times are March 29 @ 8 pm, March 30 @ 8 pm, March 31 @ 3 pm and 8 pm, and April 1 @ 3 pm. Admission is free, but seating is limited, so please call to reserve seats. (There will be a suggested donation of $10 at some performances.) The conservatory is located inside the Georgetown Lutheran Church at the corner of Wisconsin Avenue and Volta Place.

Our Lady of Sandwich, by Mario Baldessari and Keith Bridges, takes place in Sandridge, North Carolina , a small Southern town that finds itself suddenly turned “head-over-Tarheels” when a diner waitress says she and her best friend were visited by the Virgin Mary. The only thing more bizarre than the reported apparitions are the comical events they set into motion around the town – pitting locals against sightseers, Baptists against Catholics, and truth against fiction. The story provides a funny, yet thought-provoking, look at the nature of miracles. The play was originally read as part of at Baltimore Playwrights Festival play-reading marathon on March 10th of this year.

Mario Baldessari is a local playwright, actor and acting instructor. He teaches classes in Comedy at The National Conservatory of Dramatic Arts, and is currently the Playwright-in-Residence at First Draft at Charter Theater. Recent plays include the a cappella comedy Three Bears at 1st Stage (coauthored with Ethan Slater and produced in partnership with First Draft); Jack and the Bean-Stalk at 1st Stage/First Draft (Helen Hayes Award Recommended); and Fat Gay Jew at Charter Theater. Other playwriting credits include: Fear Itself, Wonders Never Cease and Sacred Cows for Charter Theater. His latest play (coauthored with Slater), The Every Fringe Show You Want to See in One Fringe Show Fringe Show, should premiere this summer at the 2012 Capital Fringe Festival.

Keith Bridges is a local playwright, director, the founder and artistic director of Charter Theater, and a founder of the Kennedy Center Page-to-Stage Festival. His playwriting credits include Lie With Me for Mutineer Theatre in Los Angeles; and the Charter Theater Productions of F.U. (Forgive Us...What'd You Think We Meant?), Monkeyboy (co-authored with Chris Stezin and Richard Washer), and Watching Left (nominated for a Helen Hayes Award).

This production of Our Lady of Sandwich will be mounted by alumni of The National Conservatory of Dramatic Arts. It will be directed by Arturo Tolentino and features Christian Beltran, Lynette Franklin, Leigh Anna Fry, Lily Kerrigan, Julia Nakamoto, Dane C. Petersen, Susan S. Porter, Sarah Pullen and Nancy Viemeister.

The Baltimore Playwrights Festival has presented 273 scripts by 165 playwrights, produced by 25 different companies, over the past 30 Years. Our mission is to provide an environment that nurtures the talents of Maryland and DC playwrights through public readings, discussions, critiques and workshopping of new plays. Our summer season is devoted to the presentation of these newly developed works in cooperation with local area theaters. Further information can be found at www.baltplayfest.org.