'8' courts aud with gay-marriage issue.(WILSHIRE AND WASHINGTON)

A star-filled courtroom drama makes its stage debut on Monday, but the intent of this one-night Broadway outing isn't boffo box office but public influence.

The play is "8," Dustin Lance Black's account of the Prop. 8 trial that unfolded over three weeks in January 2010, eventually leading to U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker's ruling declaring California's ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional. With a cast that includes John Lithgow, Morgan Freeman, Ellen Barkin, Rob Reiner and Anthony Edwards, the reading at the Eugene O'Neill Theater will benefit the court effort to overturn Prop. 8.

The trial was not televised, and still pending is whether tapes of the proceedings will get a public release, but the play itself underscores …