Artistic Director/Producer Robert Egan to Pass the Baton at end of 2022

Change is coming for the Ojai Playwrights Conference. Artistic Director/Producer Robert Egan has decided to move onward at the end of 2022, OPC’s 25th Anniversary Season. He has led the organization for 21 incredible years, bringing the Ojai Playwrights Conference to national attention and making it one of the leading new play development programs in the U.S.

Robert will continue to produce and oversee upcoming OPC events this year, including the Benefit Gala on June 4 and the New Works Festival, August 7-14. And he will be celebrated at a fall farewell dinner in Ojai.

A 12-member committee is facilitating a nationwide search for Robert's replacement, with the goal of having the new artistic director selected before the end of this year.

Robert Egan leads post-play discussion for HANNAH AND THE DREAD GAZEBO during OPC New Works Festival 2013.. L to R": May Adrales (director); Jiehae Park (playwright); Alice Tuan (dramaturge)

“I let the OPC board know a few years ago, prior to the pandemic, that I wanted to shift my career focus onto several theatre, film and television projects that are near and dear to my creative heart. Then the pandemic struck. I happily stayed on to assist the OPC family in surviving and sustaining both financially and artistically in the most challenging of times. We have emerged stronger than ever, so now I am free to pursue my other interests including my work with marginalized youth and community activist artists. This developmental work will include creating a writing and performance workshop, “The Ramsdell Project”, with my wife, writer, director, actress, storyteller, Michelle Joyner, who works extensively with women writers. This work will take place on our farm in the Berkshires in Massachusetts. I do plan to continue my work in Los Angeles, where I have so loved being a part of the theatre community for forty years, and also on the east coast where so many of my colleagues reside.

Over the past 21 years, the OPC staff, board and our generous volunteers have significantly expanded the scope and depth of the programming, the community involvement and the sheer number and diversity of plays and playwrights represented in a way even I could not have imagined.

It’s a satisfying moment to hand over the leadership role especially after the last two pandemic years of developmental work by our extraordinary administrative and artistic staff who are committed to nurture plays and playwrights who imagine and fight for a better world. We all can celebrate a successful and a most promising future for OPC. You are held in loving, caring and talented hands.”

- ROBERT EGAN, OPC ARTISTIC DIRECTOR/PRODUCER

Robert Egan directs OPC Board President Carl Thelander (center) and playwright Robin Gerber in WAKE UP! - An OPC climate change special event in 2019.

“For more than two decades Robert brought to the OPC an immense passion for storytelling and finding ways to better understand ‘the human condition.' In that journey, he never lost sight of OPC’s mission to explore and understand the social changes we all face every day.

His guidance over the years nurtured and elevated the OPC into the forefront of developing new works and writers who are compelled to address, with courage and conviction, the issues of these tumultuous times.

On behalf of the entire board of directors, we greatly appreciate Robert’s passion and leadership – he has set a very high bar for our next artistic leader. We look forward to his continuing contributions to the OPC as a passionate, creative person with a vision that simply cannot be ignored."

- CARL THELANDER, OPC BOARD PRESIDENT

Luis Alfaro (top, left) and other artists in the MILESTONES event at OPC 2013, directed by Robert Egan (bottom, right)

“Robert's biggest gift to the American theatre is his love of new plays. In the sanctuary that is the Ojai Playwrights Conference, he has nurtured them, helped walk them to full maturity and provided a necessary element of the field: a safe space to experiment, interrogate and imagine the possibility of new theatre work. He is an essential element in the history of new play development in the American regional theatre. Bravo, Bob."

- LUIS ALFARO, OPC PLAYWRIGHT/ASSOCIATE PRODUCER
& CENTER THEATRE GROUP ASSOCIATE ARTISTIC DIRECTOR

Don't miss your chance to say farewell to Robert and wish him well. Three exciting events are planned for OPC's 25th Anniversary season:

BENEFIT GALA: JUNE 4
At the Kirk Douglas Theatre in Culver City.
Tickets go on sale in early April.

OPC NEW WORKS FESTIVAL: AUGUST 7-14
Back in Ojai, with new play workshops and special events.
Passes go on sale late June.
HARVEST DINNER: OCTOBER TBA
Toasting Robert Egan's OPC Legacy!
An exclusive fall dinner in Ojai to close out our 25th season.