Photo Coverage: 'Love Letters' Concert with Peters & Dossett

Broadway legend Bernadette Peters and John Dossett performed in a one-night reading of A.R. Gurney's Love Letters to benefit Opening Act, an innovative nonprofit that provides free after-school theater programming to New York City's most under-served public high schools.

The reading took place on Monday, September 24 (7PM reception, 8PM performance) at New World Stages (340 West 50th Street in Manhattan).

Michael Mastro (Broadway's 12 Angry Men, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Kissing Jessica Stein) directed Gurney's "poignantly funny play about the relationship of Andrew Makepeace Ladd and Melissa Gardner. Told entirely through a series of letters, the play traces Andrew and Melissa's relationship from childhood to adolescence to middle age in a moving portrait of a bittersweet friendship," describe press notes.

Love Letters was Opening Act's third annual benefit reading. Opening Act is a unique nonprofit that brings free, long-term, quality theater programming to New York City schools that wouldn't otherwise have a stage of their own.� Its after-school programs in seven of NYC's most under-served public high schools give students the opportunity to explore their creativity through improvisation, acting and playwriting - and let students shine in productions they write and perform themselves.� Proceeds of the evening go directly to support the programs in Clara Barton, Cobble Hill, Franklin K. Lane, Graphic Communication Arts, Tilden, Samuel Gompers and Walton High Schools.� Please visit www.OpeningActNewYork.org to read more about Opening Act's programs and talented teens.

Photos by Ben Strothmann

John Dossett and Bernadette Peters

Opening Act kids: Amanda Mewa, Neilia McKenzie, Ellio Martinez, Christine Beaubrun, Linette Alvarez and AJ Ortiz

John Dossett and Bernadette Peters

front: Suzy Myers (Creative and Artistic Director of Opening Act), Christine Beaubrun, Bernadette Peters, Neilia McKenzie, Amanda Mewa; back: AJ Ortiz, Michael Mastro, John Dossett, Linette Alvarez and Ellio Martinez