Thia Breen, Barbara Goldsmith, Cornelia Guest Honored By Women's Project

Estée Lauder's Thia Breen, author and historian Barbara Goldsmith and philanthropist and animal activist Cornelia Guest are Women's Project's 2012 Women of Achievement who will be inducted at its 27th Annual Gala Celebration hosted by the columnist Cindy Adams at the Copacabana, 268 West 47th Street, on Monday, March 5, at 6:30pm.

Also on hand for the evening are Global Brand President of Clinique Lynne Greene, fashion designers Mark Badgley and James Mischka, and film director and writer Nora Ephron, who will be presenting the awards, and Bonnie Pfeifer Evans, who is honorary chair and a 2011 Women of Achievement.

"Each year, Women's Project, the acclaimed off Broadway theater company that produces work written and directed by women, takes pride in celebrating the extraordinary accomplishments of women from the worlds of entertainment and business. Women's Project's extraordinary group of past recipients includes Bonnie Pfeifer Evans, Mindy Grossman, Bebe Neuwirth, Kathleen Turner, Dame Judi Dench, Gloria Steinem, Tina Brown, Eve Ensler, Whoopi Goldberg, Annie Leibovitz, Estelle Parsons, Laurie Anderson, Suzanne Vega and Joan Osborne to name but a few," said Julie Crosby, the Producing Artistic Director of Women's Project.

Annette Green is chair for the Gala Celebration and co-chairs are Cassandra Del Viscio, Lucia Hwong Gordon, Cassandra Seidenfeld Lyster and Arlene Scanlan.

Single Tickets are $1,000, $500. Tables of ten are $50,000, $25,000 and $12,500. For more ticket purchasing information click www.womensproject.org/awards.htm, call 212.647.1828 or email womensproject@dalzell.com.

Thia Breen is President of North America for the Estée Lauder Companies. In this role she is responsible for driving sales and profits for all the Company’s brands in North America across all distribution channels.

Joining the company in 1977, Ms. Breen has worked on leading beauty brands including: Aramis, Clinique, and Origins, where as a member of the founding team she helped to establish the brand’s unique profile.

She left the Estée Lauder Companies in 2002 and joined Federated Merchandising Group as Senior Vice President, Cosmetics and Fragrances. In her tenure at Federated, Ms. Breen gained further insight into the many challenges of today’s retailing environment. She re-joined the Estée Lauder Companies in 2005 as President of the Americas for the Estée Lauder brand and in 2007 become President Worldwide of the brand, a position she held until her recent promotion in July 2009.

Ms. Breen is a graduate of the University of Minnesota, with a degree in marketing. She serves as a board member on the National Mother’s Day Council and Cosmetic Executive Women. In 2007, Ms. Breen received a CEW Achiever Award, honored as a leader in beauty.

Barbara Goldsmith has been elected a “Living Landmark” (by the New York Landmark Conservancy and its affiliates), awarded the Order of Merit by the Republic of Poland and elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Dr. Goldsmith is a noted author and historian. Her well-known, award-winning, bestselling books include The Straw Man, Little Gloria . . . Happy at Last (for which she won an Emmy for the mini-series featuring Angela Landsbury, Christopher Plummer and Bette Davis), Johnson v. Johnson, Other Powers: The Age of Suffrage, Spiritualism and the Scandalous Victoria Woodhull, and Obsessive Genius: The Inner World of Marie Curie which recently won the prestigious American Institute of Physics Best Book Award and has been translated into twenty-three languages, sparking a new interest in Madame Curie. Currently she is co-producer and special advisor to a television special on this subject.

Dr. Goldsmith was a Founding and Contributing Editor of New York Magazine, the Senior Editor of Harper’s Bazaar, and has written for The New York Times and The New Yorker. Dr. Goldsmith has received four doctorates in the field of Literature and in Humane Letters, honoris causa. She is the donor of the Preservation and Conservation Divisions of The New York Public Library and New York University and the Barbara Goldsmith Rare Book Room at the American Academy in Rome.

Among her many awards was an appointment to the President’s Commission for the Celebration of Women in American History, a Lifetime Achievement Award in Literary Arts of the Guild Hall Academy of the Arts, the Poets and Writers “Writers for Writers” award, the American Publishers Association Literary Award and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Best Non-Fiction Book. She has received a Presidential Citation and served on the New York State Council on the Arts, on the commission for Preservation and Access, and the Permanent Paper Task Force of the National Library of Medicine.

As a crusader for human rights, she is donor of the PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award. Goldsmith is a Trustee and Literary Lion of the New York Public Library, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Authors League, Authors Guild of America, Poets and Writers and was honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award from Literacy Partners. www.barbaragoldsmith.com.

Cornelia Guest has been passionate about animals and nature since she was a child. Her passion is reflected in every aspect of her life including her philanthropy, animal activism and business enterprises.

Ms. Guest is the author of the Cornelia Guest's Simple Pleasures: Healthy Seasonal Cooking and Easy Entertaining, which will be released by Weinstein Books in May 2012. In 2009 she founded Cornelia Guest Events and Cornelia Guest Cookies, catering high- end charity and entertainment events with healthy, vegan dishes. Her mission is to encourage and inspire people to be conscious of the diet choices they make in their daily lives.

Currently Ms. Guest has a line of animal-friendly bags available at Bloomingdale’s. Along with her spring collection, she is also working on a line of jewelry, wallets and dog accessories. Her next project is a book (Weinstein Company, May 2012) that will include original recipes, decorating and party tips, and photos from throughout her life.

Daughter of American fashion icon CZ Guest and polo champion Winston FredeRick Churchill Guest, Ms. Guest has been able to use her media attention and professional contacts to support Humane Society of New York, and was named by Donna Karan as one of the Women Who Inspire. She also serves on the Mayoral appointed Grow NYC board. Ms. Guest has been an advocate for New Yorkers for Marriage Equality and in 2010 hosted their New York flagship event with Mayor Bloomberg.

Background on the 27th Anniversary of Women of Achievement Award

This year's Women of Achievement Award marks the 27th anniversary of the award. Past recipients include Bonnie Pfeifer Evans, Mindy Grossman, Bebe Neuwirth, Kathleen Turner, Laurie Anderson, Joan Osborne, Suzanne Vega Estelle Parsons, Toni Morrison, Beverly Sills, Diane Sawyer, Gloria Steinem, Donna Karan, Susan Sarandon, Barbara Walters, Rosie O'Donnell, Katie Couric, Lauren Bacall, Maya Angelou, Dame Judy Dench, Joan Didion, Eveyln Lauder, Whoopi Goldberg, Twyla Tharp, Susan Lucci, Eve Ensler and Kerry Washington, among many others. In 1999, the late Gerald Schoenfeld of The Shubert Organization became the first and only male recipient of the award

Background on 34 Years of Presenting Women Theater Artists

Women's Project is playing a hot hand this season with its widely acclaimed Milk Like Sugar by Kirsten Greenidge and How The World Began by Catherine Trieschmann.

Women’s Project was founded in 1978 by Julia Miles to address the significant under-representation of women in the American theater, and has since built a tremendous legacy. Although even today women playwrights and directors severely lack parity in pay and opportunity, the extraordinary women artists who have broken through the glass ceiling have all first crossed the threshold at WP, including Eve Ensler, Lynn Nottage, Maria Irene Fornes, Suzan-Lori Parks, Sarah Ruhl, Paula Vogel, and Anna Deavere Smith, among the many. Throughout its 34-year history, Women’s Project has produced and/or developed over 600 plays and published 11 anthologies of plays.

Recently acclaimed plays produced by Women's Project include this season's How the World Began and Milk Like Sugar and, from season's past, Freshwater, Aliens with Extraordinary Skills, crooked, Sand, Or, Smudge, Lascivious Something and Apple Cove.