Recipient of the 2008 Regional Theatre Tony Award, Chicago Shakespeare Theater offers a broad spectrum of theatrical experiences year-round, engaging and entertaining audiences from all walks of life and from around the world. The plays of William Shakespeare form the core of our company’s work and Subscription Series, featuring selections from Shakespeare’s 38-play canon complemented by other dramatic works—from traditional classical theater to new classics that resonate with Shakespeare’s timeless insights into the human condition.

As Chicago Shakespeare strives to share our uniquely American brand of Shakespeare with the world, so do we also strive to bring to Chicago some of the best theater the world has to offer. To our World’s Stage Series, we bring international theatrical productions to our city, presenting new cultural expressions and experiences for Chicago audiences and artists alike.

Chicago Shakespeare is committed to making theater an expansive, ever-changing and lifelong relationship. For our family audiences, CST Family presents abridged Shakespeare productions and classic musicals. Our education outreach program, Team Shakespeare, helps Shakespeare come alive for students and teachers in classrooms throughout the Midwest—and this year will reach its millionth student.

Two complementary performance spaces in our theater on Navy Pier provide a perfect home for artists and audiences alike. The thrust stage of the 500-seat Jentes Family Auditorium (inspired by the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Swan Theatre) necessitates an intimate, immediate relationship between the actors and their audience members, who sit around three sides of the stage. By contrast, the Carl and Marilynn Thoma Theater, a 200-seat black box, offers practically limitless versatility to suit the creative choices of an artistic team.

Through a 48-week season encompassing more than 600 performances, CST leads the community as the largest employer of Chicago actors. CST attracts 225,000 audience members annually, including 18,000 subscribers and nearly 50,000 students and teachers.