Penumbra Competitors

Conceived over 60 years ago as one of the nation’s first nonprofit theaters, The Public has long operated on the principles that theater is an essential cultural force and that art and culture belong to everyone. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Oskar Eustis and Executive Director Patrick Willingham, The Public’s wide breadth of programming includes an annual season of new work at its landmark home at Astor Place, Free Shakespeare in the Park at The Delacorte Theater in Central Park, the Mobile Unit touring throughout New York City’s five boroughs, Public Works, Public Shakespeare Initiative, and Joe’s Pub. Since premiering HAIR in 1967, The Public continues to create the canon of American Theater and is currently represented on Broadway by the Tony Award-winning musical Hamilton by Lin-Manuel Miranda. Their programs and productions can also be seen regionally across the country and around the world. The Public has received 60 Tony Awards, 190 Obie Awards, 57 Drama Desk Awards, 61 Lortel Awards, 36 Outer Critics Circle Awards, 13 New York Drama Critics’ Circle Awards, 62 AUDELCO Awards, 6 Antonyo Awards, and 6 Pulitzer Prizes. Cover photo by Steve Brown

The Guthrie Theater was founded by Sir Tyrone Guthrie in 1963 and is dedicated to producing the great works of dramatic literature, developing the work of contemporary playwrights and cultivating the next generation of theater artists. Under the artistic leadership of Joseph Haj, the Guthrie produces a mix of classic and contemporary plays on three stages, and continues to set a national standard for excellence in theatrical production and performance.

The Alley was founded over 70 years ago as Houston’s theatre company. It exists to provide audiences with the highest quality theatre, offering a wide variety of work including new plays, classics, the re-discovered and the rarely-performed, and new musical theatre, with an emphasis on new American works – to provide the inspirational and the provocative – to make our audiences think, feel, dream, and be entertained. The Alley Theatre is one of the few American theatre companies that supports a company of actors, designers, artisans and craftspeople throughout the year. Our productions are built and rehearsed in the Alley Theatre Center for Theatre Production – a 75,000-square-foot facility adjacent to the theatres themselves – that is state-of-the-art and one of the most complete and largest facilities of its kind anywhere. The mission of the Alley Theatre, under the direction of Artistic Director Rob Melrose and Managing Director Jennifer Bielstein, is to inspire and enchant lives through a variety of theatrical experiences at the highest level of artistic excellence with our Resident Acting Company at the center.