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OUR MISSION
New Leaf Theatre creates intimate, animate theatrical experiences that renew artist and audience.
We believe that the process of creating theatre and the product that we create bring innumerable opportunities for deep personal engagement with one another and with the challenges that we face as human beings. We want our collaborators to leave our process with a refreshed sense of purpose and commitment to their craft. We want audiences to leave our productions eager to look at the world through a new lens.
During a performance, the actors and audience inhabit the space together, living through a communal experience infused with life and soul and vigor. Our journeys in life and on stage are seldom easy. Sometimes we have to go through a dark tunnel before we find the light. Renewal does not guarantee a happy ending; it rather offers the possibility of a new beginning.
OUR VALUES
Our core values of growth, connection, and honesty guide us as we work to live out our mission and look toward realizing our vision. From our business practices to rehearsals to performances, we seek opportunities for growth - from both our successes and our failures. The connections within and among the company, our collaborators, the artists and audience members, and the community at large are essential to our growth. Running through all we do is our pursuit of honesty. Whether portraying a moment on stage that illuminates our human condition, creating a marketing piece, or resolving conflict within the company, honesty is our touchstone; it is what allows us finally to connect and to grow.
OUR VISION
New Leaf Theatre will reawaken personal connections in order to confront our increasing disengagement and rediscover - together with our audience - a piece of our shared humanity.
In order to fulfill our mission of renewal on a larger scale, we must enable ourselves, our collaborators, our friends, our neighbors, our city to connect with one another and the world at large. Our understanding of community has changed dramatically in the last century, but we believe the possibility of true connection still lies within us. The shared experience of performance offers a visceral reminder of what it is to come together, and creates an opportunity to re-enter the world with a renewed sense of our common humanity.
Jessica Hutchinson
Artistic Director
In addition to directing and producing for the company, Jessica spearheads our board development efforts and heads our season selection process. Jessica holds a B.A. in Theatre Performance from the University of Nebraska - Lincoln. After working in the Education Department at the Goodman Theatre, she served as Learning Programs Manager at Chicago Shakespeare Theater, and joined the faculty at the National High School Institute ("Cherubs") at Northwestern University in 2008.
Marsha Harman
Business Manager
Artist in Residence
Marsha loves acting with New Leaf more than just about anything. She serves as the company's Business Manager, works on grant proposals, and very occasionally takes on the role of dramaturg or music director. She's performed with WNEP and Griffin Theatres in Chicago, and spent several summers with the Bakerloo Theatre Project, a classical theatre company in upstate New York. Marsha holds a B.A. in Theatre Arts from Drew University, and an M.A. in Theatre History and Criticism from The Catholic University of America.
Marni Keenan
Production Manager
Box Office Manager
Artist in Residence
Marni has served New Leaf as a stage manager, set and props designer, scenic artist, and is our current production manager and box office manager. She has worked as a scenic artist and props designer for several Chicago theatres, including TimeLine, Raven, and Pegasus Players. She has taught design for the National High School Institute ("Cherubs") at Northwestern University. Marni also freelances as a production manager and graphic designer, creating websites, virtual portfolios, and promotional material for storefront theaters and other artists. In her free time, she is a bookbinder, letterpress printer, illustrator, and photographer. Marni received her BFA in Theatre Design/Technology from Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio.
Nick Keenan
Marketing Director
Artist in Residence
Nick serves as New Leaf's marketing director, resident sound designer, and webmaster. His over 100 sound design credits in the Chicago area include work with Court, Next, Chicago Dramatists, Peninsula Players, Dog & Pony, the side project, TUTA, the Neo-Futurists, Remy Bumppo, Metropolis, Raven, Apple Tree, Rivendell, Greasy Joan & Co., A Red Orchid, and assistant designs at the Goodman, Chicago Shakespeare, and Milwaukee Shakespeare. Nick has been a faculty member at the National High School Institute ("Cherubs") at Northwestern University since 2003 and served as a sound engineer at the Goodman Theatre for seven years. Nick's online innovation projects for theater include the national job search page Backstagejobs.com, the Chicago Theater Database, and his blog, Theater for the Future. Nick is also a web project manager and programmer for the creative firm Marshall Creative, which is owned and operated by theatrical professionals with the philosophy that high-quality dramatic storytelling, improvisational techniques and design can be the key to agile communications in any corporate or non-profit market. Nick earned a B.A. in Theater from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
Artist in Residence
Kyra has worked with New Leaf as an actor, choreographer and director since joining the company in 2005. As an actor she has also worked at the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, Boulder Fringe Festival, Brown Couch Theatre, Chicago Scriptworks at Silk Road, Hell in a Handbag, New Theater Collective and Rasaka Theatre. As a director she has also worked with Collaboraction, 20% Theatre, the side project, Infusion theatre and WNEP Theatre. She graduated with a BFA in Theatre Performance from the University of Colorado in Boulder, CO. Kyra is currently directing for 20% Theatre's Snapshots Festival and collaborating on a piece for Rivendell Theatre's Trojan Women Project.
Jared Moore
Artist in Residence
Jared is an accomplished lighting designer who has lit more than 100 shows in Chicago - in a variety of genres. Jared is also resident designer/artistic associate with the Hypocrites and Nomi LaMad Dance Inc, and has
designed for Redmoon, Noble Fool, ATC, Bailiwick Repertory, Porchlight, The Side Project, Metropolis, City Lit, Circle, White Horse, Theo Ubique, Infamous Commonwealth, Pyewacket, L'Opera Piccola, Adventure Stage, Backstage, & the Chicago Academy for the Arts. His work has earned four Non-Equity Jeff Awards for Lighting Design, as well as several After Dark Awards. Jared holds a B.F.A. in Theatre and Design from Georgia College and State University in Milledgeville, Georgia.
Michelle Lilly
Artist in Residence
Michelle has stage managed and designed scenery for several New Leaf shows, and has also worked with Stage Left, Lifeline, and Griffin. Michelle spent a season as a teaching artist in Lifeline's educational outreach program, and works full-time as the Technical Assistant in the scenery department at Chicago Shakespeare Theater. She also designs scenery downstate at the Springfield Muni, where she has done several musicals over the past few years. Michelle holds a B.A. in Theatre and English from Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri.
Eleanor Hyde
Director of Special Partnerships
Eleanor is a theatre producer and artist constantly searching for the new normal. Passionate about reinventing the models by which art is created and shared she is currently engaged in writing and exploring how small and informal performance companies can maintain vital art making practices. She has worked with theatre companies large and small including Lookingglass Theatre Company, The Hangar Theatre (Ithaca, NY) and Chicago Shakespeare Theater. She is a graduate of DePaul University and Chicago Shakespeare Theater's Arts Leadership Program (MFA) and Sarah Lawrence College.
Josh Sobel
Literary Manager
Josh has had the privilege of working in Chicago with A Red Orchid Theatre, Victory Gardens Theater, Bohemian Theatre Ensemble, and The Pavement Group at Steppenwolf Theatre Company, as well as Barrington Stage Company in Pittsfield, MA. He holds a BA in Theatre with Honors in Directing from Oberlin College, and is an alumnus of the National Theater Institute (NTI) at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. Josh serves as the Associate Director of the O'Neill's summer NTI program, "Theatermakers," and is the Executive Producer of the third annual Element: A New Plays Festival.
Cara Clifford
Front of House Manager
Cara is also a staff member of About Face Theatre, where she plans events and writes grants for the development department. Recently she co-founded Ag47, an arts program for middle school and high school girls in the Chicago neighborhood of Logan Square. Cara is also busy at work producing Leaves of Grass, a one-night only nude choral reading of Walt Whitman's poetry at Links Hall in October 2010. As an undergraduate at the University of Chicago, Cara studied Classical Studies and was a proud member of the U of C's acclaimed improv and sketch comedy group Off-Off Campus.
The Lincoln Park Cultural Center
2045 N. Lincoln Park West | Chicago, IL
Our home in Lincoln Park is a registered Chicago Landmark, designed in 1926 by Edwin H. Clark. As one of the hubs of the Chicago Park District in Lincoln Park, the LPCC is a hotbed of community activity year round. In addition to a unique theatrical venue, the LPCC boasts a early childhood center, lapidary and stained glass shop, a ceramics studio, a game room, a dance studio, a full service woodshop and a wide variety of cultural and community classes and activities. New Leaf is proud to be the resident theater company of the LPCC, and shares the auditorium with other cultural institutions such as the Arts at Large Wednesday Night Concert Series.
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