Porchlight Music Theatre

Porchlight is the center for music theatre in Chicago. Through award-winning live performance, education and community engagement we impact thousands of lives each season, bringing the magic of musicals to our theatre home at the Ruth Page Center for the Arts in the city’s Gold Coast and to neighborhoods across the city. Porchlight has built a national reputation for boldly reimagining classic musicals, supporting new works and young performers, and showcasing Chicago’s most notable music theatre artists, all through the intimate and powerful theatrical lens of the “Chicago Style.” Now in our 26th season, our quarter-century production history includes more than 70 mainstage works with 15 Chicago premieres and five world premieres. Porchlight’s commitment to the past, present and future of music theatre led the company to develop the Porchlight Revisits and New Faces Sing Broadway program series, both quickly becoming audience favorites. Porchlight’s education and engagement programs serve schools, youth of all ages and skill levels, music theatre professionals, musical enthusiasts and community organizations such as Chicago Youth Centers. We annually award dozens of full scholarships and hundreds of free tickets to ensure accessibility and real engagement with this uniquely American art form. Through the current global pandemic, Porchlight has emerged as one of Chicago’s leaders in virtual programming, quickly launching a host of free and premium offerings. Porchlight’s 2020-2021 season has included Broadway by the Decade, New Faces Sing Broadway 1987, The Ruffians’ Burning Bluebeard, New Faces Sing Broadway 1961, Chicago Sings Rock & Roll Broadway as well as collaborations with musical artists around the world. Porchlight will return to live performance this summer with New Faces Sing Broadway 1979 (June 12) and Broadway in Your Backyard (August 7) outdoors at the North Shore Center in Skokie.