Portland Town Hall Meeting, Saturday January 31

Please see below the Press Release for Gary Garrison's visit and the upcoming Town Hall Meeting in Portland, January 31, 2009. David Faux will also give a "Author as CEO" lecture on intellectual property rights.

If you have any questions regarding the area or the event, please contact the new co-reps, Andrea Stolowitz (astolowi@yahoo.com) and Steve Patterson (splatterson@mindspring.com)

I hope some of you might be able to make the drive down there and show support!

Cheers,
Dennis

PRESS RELEASE :

Representatives from the Dramatists Guild of America, including Gary Garrison, Executive Director of Creative Affairs for the Guild, will visit Portland on January 31, 2009, to hold a Dramatists Guild Town Hall Meeting for Oregon's Guild members and other interested playwrights, followed by a Portland Theatre Town Hall Meeting,
inviting Portland's theatre community to discuss development of new plays. Both events are free and open to the public.

Mr. Garrison's visit emphasizes Portland's growing reputation as an incubator of new work and coincides with Portland's innovative, inaugural Fertile Ground City-Wide New Works Festival, which was recently profiled in American Theatre Magazine and the Dramatists Guild's The Dramatist Magazine.

The Dramatists Guild Town Hall Meeting will begin at 1:00 PM, featuring with an information session that will detail an overview of the Dramatists Guild, discuss plans for its future, and then an open Q & A for Guild members. In addition to Gary Garrison, speakers will include David Faux, (Guild Director of Business Affairs), Roland Tec (Guild Director of Membership), and Steve Patterson and Andrea
>Stolowitz, Portland's Regional Guild Representatives. From 2:00 PM to 3:00 PM, David Faux will present "The Author as a CEO": a short lecture, which will review the main points of dealing with a playwright's portfolio of works as intellectual property assets.

After a half-hour break, the afternoon will resume from 3:30 PM to 5:00 PM with a Portland Theatre Town Hall Meeting. Moderated by Mead Hunter, Portland Center Stage's Director of Literary Programs, the Town Hall will feature a panel discussion with Mr. Garrison, Lui Douthit of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, and Michael Rohd of Sojourn Theatre, discussing trends in local and national theatre, playwriting, and dramaturgy. The meeting will then open up as a brainstorming session for the panel, Portland theatre leaders, and the audience to address how to foster development and production of new plays in Portland and Oregon.

The Dramatists Guild Town Hall and Portland Theatre Town Hall will both be held at Portland Center Stage's Ellen Bye Studio Theatre, 128 NW Eleventh Avenue, Portland, Oregon.

For more information on both events, please contact the Dramatists
Guild's new Portland co-representatives: Andrea Stolowitz (astolowi@yahoo.com) and Steve Patterson (splatterson@mindspring.com) >[or contact Steve Patterson at 503-312-6665].