GARDINER — The Open Book Players will perform “The Picture of Dorian Gray” at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 30, and 2 p.m. Sunday, March 31, at Johnson Hall Performing Arts Center, 280 Water St. Doors open a half hour before the show.

Tickets are $8 for adults and $5 for youth. Tickets are available at the box office from noon to 3 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, at 207-582-7144 or by visiting  www.johnsonhall.org.

Dorian Gray is the subject of a full-length portrait in oil by Basil Hallward, an artist who is impressed and infatuated by Dorian’s beauty; he believes that Dorian’s beauty is responsible for the new mood in his art as a painter. Through Basil, Dorian meets Lord Henry Wotton, and he soon is enthralled by the aristocrat’s hedonistic world view: that beauty and sensual fulfillment are the only things worth pursuing in life.

Newly understanding that his beauty will fade, Dorian expresses the desire to sell his soul to ensure that the picture, rather than he, will age and fade. The wish is granted, and Dorian pursues a libertine life of varied and amoral experiences, while staying young and beautiful; all the while his portrait ages and records every sin.

The Open Book Players performs literary works in the tradition of readers theater.