ABOUT

The only theatre company of its kind in Bloomington

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ABOUT STAGES

A non-profit theatre company since 2006, Stages Bloomington Theatre Company offers exceptional year-round theatre arts education and performance opportunities for children and teens in Bloomington and surrounding counties. Programs build passion for the arts, promote self confidence, teach collaboration and help young people become better students and citizens. It is the only theatre company in the area that offers a two-semester mentoring program for advanced high school and college freshmen actors.

Programming is guided by the belief that good theatre is good theatre, regardless of the age of the performers, and a commitment to creating exciting, high quality, meaningful, and memorable live theatre for audiences of all ages.

Our educational vision promotes empathy, critical thinking, and a larger world view. Participants and audiences are encouraged to examine the world from a social and historical perspective.

Stages views every production as an artistic and educational process. Stages produces three-five shows each year geared to family and adult audiences. Standards and expectations are the same as for any quality production: experienced artists are hired for production team and instructor positions; productions follow the process of professional theatre with auditions and rehearsals for the actors as well as off-stage activities including set design, lighting, costumes, music, and marketing.  Shows are typically sold out and draw an annual audience of over 3,000.

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HISTORY 

Stages Bloomington began with a fifteen minute pre-show performance before a production of “Amahl and the Night Visitors” by Bloomington Music Works (BMW) in December 2005. The performance was very well received, and the next spring, BMW offered a full-length production of Disney's Beauty and the Beast, performed by 1st - 8th graders. At that time, the BMW organization underwent a transition and became exclusively a youth theater organization, changing its name to Stages Bloomington.

Since those first shows, Stages Bloomington has produced thirty-four fully-staged musicals and plays performed exclusively by children and teens. Annual main stage productions draw audiences of all ages. In his end-of-the-year column, Peter Jacobi, music columnist for the Herald-Times listed Brundibar, Hans Krasa’s children’s opera co-produced by Stages and The Jewish Theatre of Bloomington as “one of the ten most notable musical events in 2016.”

A troupe from Stages traveled to the Junior Theater Festival in Atlanta, Georgia, where our actors won the Broadway Junior Spirit Award, the festival's top honor, as well as the Freddie G Outstanding Achievement in Music Award.

Stages continues to develop a wide range of classes, workshops, summer camps, and performance experiences that provide young actors, singers, and dancers the opportunity to learn from skilled professionals.