MCLA Theatre Announces 2026-2027 Season

Celebrating Collaboration, Creativity, and the Art of Storytelling

By: MCLA - Oct 20, 2026

 

Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts (MCLA) Theatre announces its 2026-2027 performance season, featuring six events that celebrate the possibilities of live theater through professional collaboration, inventive storytelling, student experimentation, and original performance.

The season opens October 23-25 with “Flight,” a special co-production with Cape Cod-based theater company P3/East and MOSAIC, and continues with Branden Jacobs-Jenkins' “Everybody,” Patrick Barlow's “The 39 Steps,” a festival of staged readings, and two student acting showcases.

Throughout the season, audiences will encounter a wide range of theatrical forms, from physically driven ensemble performance and contemporary reinterpretations of classic stories to devised movement, Shakespeare, and new explorations of dramatic literature. Together, the productions reflect MCLA Theatre's commitment to collaborative theater-making, creative experimentation, and opportunities for students to develop their artistic voices.

All performances are free and open to the public, and take place in Venable Theater on the MCLA campus.

“Flight”
Conceived by Steve Pearson, written by Robyn Hunt
October 23-25, 2026
Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m.; Sunday at 2 p.m.

MCLA Theatre, MOSAIC, and Cape Cod-based theater company P3/East come together for a highly physical theatrical exploration of the women who challenged convention and took to the skies at the dawn of aviation.

Long before Amelia Earhart, pioneering aviators such as Harriet Quimby, Raymonde de Laroche, Bessie Coleman, Katherine Stinson, Blanche Stuart Scott, and Matilde Moisant pursued the exhilarating and dangerous possibilities of flight, often in the face of tremendous social and technological obstacles.

Part of a trilogy that also includes “Gravity” and “Balance,” “Flight” honors these remarkable women and the many others whose contributions to aviation history have been overlooked.

Drawing on P3/East's rigorous physical training and movement-based performance practice, the production brings these stories to life through the expressive possibilities of the human body. Featuring performers from P3/East alongside MCLA Theatre alumni, “Flight” brings professional artists and MCLA graduates together on the Venable stage for a celebration of courage, imagination, and ensemble storytelling.

“Everybody”
By Branden Jacobs-Jenkins
December 4-6, 2026
Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m.; Sunday at 2 p.m.

MCLA Theatre presents a bold, funny, and surprisingly moving reimagining of the medieval morality play “Everyman” by acclaimed playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins.

Co-directed by Professor of Theatre Laura Standley and senior MCLA Theatre major Rory DiVenuto ’27, the play follows its title character on an unexpected journey toward life's one unavoidable destination. Along the way, Everybody turns to Friendship, Kinship, Stuff, Love, and others for help answering a question that belongs to us all: What really matters when our time runs out?

Presented as part of the College’s Theatre Lab, a workshop venue for student experimentation and artistic exploration, “Everybody” extends its collaborative spirit beyond performance. The company will work together to develop the production's design elements, creating its theatrical world through a shared process of experimentation, discovery, and invention.

Playful and deeply human, “Everybody” transforms a centuries-old story into a contemporary exploration of what it means to be alive while inviting MCLA student artists to discover together how that story can best be told.

Moments from the Studio: Fall Acting Showcase
Friday, Dec. 11, 2026, at 7 p.m.

MCLA Theatre invites audiences into the studio for an evening celebrating the work of its developing student actors.

The fall showcase features work created in Acting, Culture, and the Creative Self and Rehearsal Ready Acting. Audiences will experience realistic scenes alongside original solo performances developed by students throughout the semester. Part performance and part glimpse into the actor's creative process, Moments from the Studio brings classroom exploration to the stage, highlighting the creativity, growth, and artistic discoveries of MCLA's student performers.

“The 39 Steps”
Adapted by Patrick Barlow from the novel by John Buchan and the film by Alfred Hitchcock
April 16-18, 2027
Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m.; Sunday at 2 p.m.

MCLA Theatre presents a fast-paced theatrical comedy directed by Professor of Theatre Laura Standley.

When an ordinary man is unexpectedly drawn into a world of spies, murder, secret organizations, and international intrigue, he finds himself racing across Britain to clear his name and uncover the mysterious secret of "The 39 Steps."

Inspired by Alfred Hitchcock's classic thriller and John Buchan's novel, Patrick Barlow's adaptation transforms the story into an inventive theatrical adventure in which a small ensemble plays dozens of characters. Part spy thriller, part romantic adventure, and part loving send-up of old-fashioned stagecraft, “The 39 Steps” is a whirlwind of quick changes, narrow escapes, theatrical invention, and comic mayhem.

Staged Reading Festival
April 30-May 2, 2027
Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m.; Sunday at 2 p.m.

MCLA Theatre presents a weekend celebrating plays, playwrights, and the power of stories brought to life on stage.

The Staged Reading Festival offers audiences the opportunity to experience a selection of plays in an intimate, actor-centered format that places the words and ideas of the playwright at the heart of the event.

With scripts in hand and minimal production elements, MCLA student artists will bring each work from the page into the shared space of live performance. Each reading offers a different theatrical world and a chance to encounter dramatic literature through one of theater's simplest and most immediate forms: actors, an audience, and a story unfolding between them.

Moments from the Studio: Spring Acting Showcase
Friday, May 7, 2027, at 7 p.m.

MCLA Theatre closes its season with an evening of performance, movement, and theatrical exploration featuring work developed in Movement Improvisation and Composition, and Acting Shakespeare classes.

Audiences will experience original devised movement pieces alongside monologues and scenes from Shakespeare, showcasing two distinct approaches to creating dynamic, embodied performance.

Bringing the discoveries of the classroom into public performance, Moments from the Studio offers audiences a chance to see MCLA student artists experiment with movement, language, character, and storytelling.

For more information, visit mcla.edu/academics/academic-departments/theatre.