Search Portland Theater
Dramatic offerings in Portland range from big productions to edgy independent works.
Looking to catch a play? Maybe even ballet or modern dance? You’re in for a treat: Portland has a well-established network of venues and theater companies and an increasingly dynamic and diverse small theater scene. Large downtown theater houses offer full-scale, world-class shows; smaller independent houses take creative risks and scout new talent; a few collectives even cater their seasons to a particular ethnic identity or special niche-like comedy, mime or puppetry. There’s really something for everyone.
Major Theaters
A great starting point for theater explorations is Portland’5 Centers for the Arts, an umbrella organization that handles booking and promotion for several of Portland’s biggest venues. In Portland’5 online calendar, you’ll find touring Broadway productions, opera, ballet and big-name solo appearances by prominent actors and comedians. The major halls are Antoinette Hatfield Hall, Portland’5 headquarters, and the three theater spaces within it: Dolores Winningstad Theatre, the Newmark Theatre and Brunish Theatre. Other locations include the Keller Auditorium, Lincoln Hall (at Portland State University) and Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall.
Portland Center Stage, the city’s largest theater company, puts on full-scale musicals and other productions on the main stage and more stripped-down avant-garde plays in its intimate basement space, the Ellyn Bye Studio — both in The Armory, a historic building in the Pearl District.
With performance space inside of The Armory, Artists Repertory Theatre favors tense dramas from contemporary playwrights as well as hosting Profile Theatre, a company that devotes each of its seasons to a single playwright.
Third Rail Repertory Theatre has a penchant for dark comedies and a take-no-prisoners acting style and splits its season between the Winningstad Theatre at Portland’5 and CoHo Theatre in Northwest Portland.
Pre-Show Bites
These lauded local eateries are all within walking distance of their respective theaters.
Children’s Theater
Kids can take a little convincing that people in costume aren’t scary, but fun — and Portland’s rich collection of children’s theater companies offer just the introduction they need. Kids already under the spell of the stage will delight in fantastical productions featuring acrobats, puppets and more.
Northwest Children’s Theater offers vibrant, accessible productions that can be enjoyed by kids as young as 4, while Oregon Children’s Theatre aims a bit older, dabbling in rock opera and exploring world affairs. The beloved kids’ show at Imago Theatre features acrobatic actors dressed as frogs, cats and a menagerie of other creatures who dance, mime, delight and surprise.
 The Judy Kafoury Center for Youth Arts offers vibrant, accessible productions, often based on classic books, that can be enjoyed by kids as young as four years old.
Upcoming Events for Kids
Explore more fun Portland events for kids.
Shakespeare
Portland hosts plenty of Shakespeare — especially in the summer through outfits like the Portland Shakespeare Project, which performs at Artists Rep, and Willamette Shakespeare and Original Practice Shakespeare, which offer free, open-air performances.
But for diehard followers of the bard, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, goes on nearly year-round in Ashland, 4.5 hours south of Portland.
Multicultural Offerings
Portland Playhouse undertakes critically acclaimed modern works, especially though not exclusively about the African American experience. The “Milagro” or Miracle Theatre Group gives voice to the pan-Latino experience with bilingual productions.
Small and Emerging Theaters
Longstanding small Portland companies like Theatre Vertigo and CoHo Productions tackle everything from Dickensian classics to Beckett-esque absurdity, while in adjacent towns Hillsboro, Milwaukie, and Lake Oswego upstarts Bag&Baggage and Chapel Theater, and veteran Lakewood also bring new twists to the classics.
Several newer theaters are scattered around Portland, and their productions often prove worth the trip. Working Theater Collective brings polish to the postmodern and the absurd and workshop new scripts. Curious Comedy Theater, which most often hosts standup and improv, shows a few plays, favoring minimal staging, spoof and solo work.
Upcoming Theater Performances
Dive into Portland's thriving theater scene at one of these upcoming shows.
More in Portland Theater
Portland theaters host a wide range of events from plays, to comedy, to dance.
Comedy in Portland
There’s always something funny happening in Portland. From stand-up comedy to improv or even comedy classes Portland has any kind of comedy you may be looking for. Portland boasts many stages to bring you fresh, up-and-coming, and touring comedians.
Classical Music in Portland
Classical music in Portland isn’t just the classics. Classical musicians offer new and innovative works, and an ongoing lineup of inspiring performances, from timeless works to modern interpretations.
Latino Arts Shine at Milagro in Portland
Milagro Theatre in Portland’s Central Eastside has been home to Latiné-American arts and culture for over 30 years.
Dance in Portland
For a city its size, Portland has a remarkably active dance scene that fills the city’s dance card with everything from ballet concerts of “Swan Lake” and “The Nutcracker” to studio productions of the freshest and grittiest contemporary work by local choreographers. If a theme runs through all of this movement, it’s innovation — Portland dance has a restless, inventive spirit that welcomes collaborations with other art forms and often spills beyond the generally accepted boundaries of dance.
International Talent
The primary presenter of dance artists from outside the city is White Bird, which has brought mostly modern dance to the city since incorporating in 1997. White Bird’s tastes generally run to the more experimental and contemporary part of the dance spectrum, especially in its Uncaged programs at Lincoln Hall at Portland State University, but even its larger shows at Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, or just next door on one of the stages at Antoinette Hatfield Hall, often feature advanced European and Asian choreographers, alongside their American peers.
Ballet
The largest ballet company in the city is Oregon Ballet Theatre, which has managed to operate at a quality level far above its budget, thanks to its artistic directors James Canfield and Christopher Stowell since its emergence in 1989 from a merger of two smaller companies. Under Stowell, the company focused on sharpening its Balanchine core and adding lots of neo-classical and story ballets to its repertoire. Its new artistic director Kevin Irving has worked with many of the most interesting dance choreographers in the world and is expected to bring a more modern feel to the company. Catch OBT’s Nutcracker every December at the Keller Auditorium.
Choreographer Sarah Slipper founded NW Dance Project in 2004 with the idea of developing a core of athletic dancers who are flexible and creative enough to work with a variety of choreographers on brand-new work, usually ballet-based but contemporary in look. That’s exactly what she’s done as the company has bent itself around dozens of new dances made by choreographers from around the world, attacking each with enthusiasm and skill.
Modern Acrobatics
BodyVox leans to the more modern part of the dance world, and its work has a theatrical often humorous side, if not downright antic. Founders Jamey Hampton and Ashley Roland bring the acrobatics of their work with Pilobolus, Momix and Iso to BodyVox, and they’ve developed a company of dancers able to meet the movement demands without neglecting the connection to the audience.
Portland has several companies that have acrobatic or aerial tendencies; A-WOL Dance Collective, Polaris Dance, Â Night Flight, each with a different emphasis. And these venerable companies, Do Jump!, Afterglow Aerial Arts, and Imago Theater, aim their acrobatic theatrics at the younger set.
Combining dance and circus arts, Tempos Contemporary Circus stages performances and hosts regular classes from acro yoga to acrobatics for beginners and community dance jams.
New Modern
Linda Austin’s Performance Works NW plays a similar role, gathering new dancers and choreographers and combining them with experienced hands — such as Austin herself. Providing a place for new dance for over twenty years, PWNW hosts an annual artist residency that showcases experiments in dance and performance at this Foster-Powell neighborhood studio and venue.
Providing a stage for multi-cultural, multi-genre, and multi-disciplinary performance-based works in Central Eastside, New Expressive Works, founded in 2012 by Subashini Ganesan, Portland’s first Creative Laureate, has become a space for conversation and innovation in the performance art scene in Portland.
Credit: Diego Diaz
Oluyinka Akinjiola’s Rejoice! Diaspora Dance Theater creates ensemble-based contemporary dance performances through African and diasporic dance with a call for social change and a space to celebrate Black joy.Â
push/FOLD is a contemporary dance company led by Samuel Hobbs. In 2019 Hobbs founded Union PDX, an annual festival of contemporary dance to celebrate the diversity of Portland’s dance scene and promote local choreographers’ work in the region.
Upcoming Dance Performances
Explore dance in Portland at these upcoming events.
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