Mission
Our mission is to develop unproduced plays of artistic excellence from diverse writers both emerging and established, and to nurture a new generation of playwrights.
About OPC
The Ojai Playwrights Conference is unique in its process of developing new plays for the American theatre by offering a safe, productive, rigorous haven for socially, politically, culturally committed writers. This is fundamental to our vision.
OPC is passionate about developing playwrights and plays that are challenging, investigating and reimagining the values, beliefs and discourses that are fundamental to the ongoing experiment that is the United States of America.
We seek playwrights who question and rigorously explore our social moment. Plays and playwrights that make us think, re-consider and ultimately propel us beyond the polarizing limitations of racial discrimination, economic disparity, religious intolerance, political myth-making, sexual bigotry - these are the writers we welcome to the community at Ojai.
Diversity is a major factor in our selection process. We seek this diversity in order to accurately reflect and refract the many voices and faces of the contemporary American experience. This diversity is evident in the writers, the acting community and core developmental artists. Generational/career diversity is also central to the Ojai Playwrights experience, so we have structured a developmental process with a healthy mix of youth, early career, mid-career, and mature writers. Geographical diversity is also important to us as we seek a rich crucible of Southern California artists along with national and international playwrights.
What makes Ojai Playwrights Conference unique and effective also has very much to do with its retreat setting - a remote natural setting. Our artists live and work together in a secluded, soulful environment where the primary concentration is on the work and on building a rare moment of intimate community, free of commercial competition and rich in artistic collaboration. Every artist who comes to OPC celebrates the highly collaborative, non-competitive process that fosters creativity, exploration and experimentation.
Our primary goal is to fulfill the vision the playwright has for their new work. At the Ojai Playwrights Conference we are not encumbered by subscription demands or the business concerns of large commercialized institutions. We are motivated by developing challenging visions of who we are as a people today in an effort to bring us closer together in a respectful and loving community - that is the essence of who we are and what we do.