LA Actor & Author Tim Cummings Launches ANTHOLOGY: The Ojai Playwrights Conference Youth Workshop 2006-2016

Los Angeles actor and author Tim Cummings has released an eclectic collection of stories, poetry, and dramatic writings written by select participants of The Ojai Playwrights Conference Youth Workshop (OPCYW). The collection, titled ANTHOLOGY: The Ojai Playwrights Conference Youth Workshop 2006-2016 is available for purchase from November 11, 2017 via www.anthologyopcyw.org.

The book sparks an emergence of bold, imaginative and diverse new artists in American theater and literature; students aged 14 - 18 offering up refreshingly unpredictable words. Under the tutelage of Program Director, Kim Maxwell, a co-founder of the Ojai Playwrights Conference, each August brings about twelve teenagers together for a week of writing that culminates in a workshop production where the students perform their freshly-minted work in front of the theater professionals participating in the Ojai Playwrights Conference and conference attendees.

The anthology is part of Cummings's 'Field Study' (required literary engagement with the community) from Antioch University Los Angeles (AULA) where Tim is working towards his Master of Fine Arts in Writing for Young People. As Associate Director of the OPCYW for many years, Tim was quote, "so inspired by the kids and the incredible work produced over the course of the weeklong program" that he decided to use the Field Study opportunity to publish the first ever collection of these works-a mélange of the heartwarming, the heartbreaking, the political, the personal. "It's a true representation of the amazing voices within this young generation," he says.

Says Cummings, "But then the work often evaporates into the ether. I felt strongly that it should be sent forth into the world. It's just too good. I have a passion for fostering the voices of our future storytellers-we need these voices; we are living in strange times- and this book is a sure-fire step in the right direction. It's filled with humor, emotion, questioning. It's bursting at the seams."

ANTHOLOGY: The Ojai Playwrights Conference Youth Workshop 2006-2016, will go on sale to the public on November 11, 2017, available in both paperback, e-book, and a forthcoming hardcover special-edition as well.

Tim Cummings is a current MFA candidate in Creative Writing at Antioch University Los Angeles. Recent publications include F(r)iction, Lunch Ticket, and ANTHOLOGY: The Ojai Playwrights Conference Youth Workshop, which he compiled and edited. He holds a BFA in Acting from NYU and has been a professional performer for over 30 years, including in the recent world premiere of Dan O'Brien's The House in Scarsdale: A Memoir for the Stage at The Theatre @ Boston Court. He is the recipient of the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Lead Actor (The Normal Heart), and LA Weekly Award for Best Supporting Actor (The New Electric Ballroom), and a StageSceneLA Award for Performance of the Year (The Woodsman).