Image Credit: NJPAC

By Taylor Smith

Experience two of the sharpest comedic minds onstage for one special evening as Stephen Colbert (a New Jersey resident) and Julia Louis-Dreyfus team up for the Ninth Annual Montclair Film Festival Benefit on Saturday, December 7 at New Jersey Performing Arts Center’s Prudential Hall in Newark. The comedic festivities begin at 8 p.m. Tickets start at $79.50 and are available for purchase at www.njpac.org.

Colbert is best known from The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and The Colbert Report. He is the winner of nine Primetime Emmy Awards, two Grammy Awards, and two Peabody Awards. Colbert originally studied to be a dramatic actor, but became interested in improvisational theater while attending Northwestern University (Louis-Dreyfus also attended Northwestern University). Following graduation, Colbert joined The Second City in Chicago, an improvisational theater troupe and one of the most prolific comedy theaters in the world. Bill Murray, Gilda Radner, John Candy, John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd, Eugene Levy, Catherine O’Hara, Mike Myers, Steve Carell, Tina Fey, and Amy Poehler, are just some of the notable comedians who got their start at The Second City.

Louis-Dreyfus has received 11 Emmy Awards and five American Comedy Awards for her work in Saturday Night Live (1982-1985), Seinfeld (1989-1998), The New Adventures of Old Christine (2006-2010), and Veep(2012-2019). In 2018, she was awarded the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor presented by the Kennedy Center as America’s highest honor.

Ticket purchases support Montclair Film, New Jersey’s leading film nonprofit and the host of the annual Montclair Film Festival on May 1-10, 2020. Montclair Film provides year-round film education, cinema, and community programs to residents throughout the Garden State.

The event is made possible with support from Rao’s Homemade Marinara Sauce.

To learn more about Montclair Film and upcoming programming, visit montclairfilm.org.