General Info

Situated in a landmark building in Greenwich Village, Cherry Lane Theatre serves as a vital lab for the development of new American works and a home for groundbreaking productions of both new and classic theater of the highest caliber. As New York's longest continuously running Off-Broadway theatre, Cherry Lane has helped to define American drama, fostering fresh, daring, and relevant theater for 85 years. Cherry Lane considers the playwright central to the dramatic event and the text the primary source of theatrical innovation and excellence. Cherry Lane's mission is inextricably linked to the history of this American original. In 1924, the visionary poet Edna St. Vincent Millay and a group of artists converted an early 19th Century industrial building into a theater they called Cherry Lane Playhouse. Over the subsequent nine decades, it has been the site for some of the most courageous experiments in the chronicles of the American stage. The Living Theatre, Theatre of the Absurd, and Downtown Theater movement all took root at the lively Playhouse ; and Cherry Lane has proven fertile ground for most of the gifted writers of the 20th century, including: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Eugene O'Neill, Clifford Odets, Gertrude Stein, T.S. Eliot, Samuel Beckett, Edward Albee, Sam Shepard, Lanford Wilson, Joe Orton, and David Mamet. In 1996, Artistic Director Angelina Fiordellisi founded the present not-for-profit as a home for artists and audiences to discover the joys and risks of theatrical invention in an atmosphere of artistic freedom and camaraderie. Drawing inspiration from the pioneering spirit of Cherry Lane's founders, the current leadership is dedicated to the development of new works by new writers, while also maintaining the Theatre's long-standing role as the home for world premieres by leading dramatists and revivals of landmark works drawn from our rich history. In the past 12 years, more than 50 plays and playwrights have been produced at Cherry Lane. Thirty-seven of these have been new works developed through our Mentor Project, and a significant number have subsequently been staged On- and Off-Broadway, as well as in regional and international theatres. Cherry Lane has a demonstrated track record of moving new dramatic works from our development programs to productions reaching larger audiences both on our own Mainstage and elsewhere.