Our Past
In 2001, Adele Robey and her late husband Bruce founded The H Street Playhouse. The H Street Playhouse opened its doors in July 2002 with a production of The Colored Museum; following that the Playhouse was rarely dark. Our belief in both the important history and the future promise of H Street, NE ensured a steady stream of producing theater companies, ready to be a part of something new and exciting, ready to help rebuild a neighborhood. Because of the wide variety of highly regarded productions at the Playhouse, thousands of visitors traveled to the H Street Corridor. This helped produce a critical mass, jump starting commercial growth with new bars and restaurants eagerly taking advantage of the new foot traffic.
When the Playhouse opened, it was hard to find a cup of coffee anywhere along the corridor. Today the length of H Street is alive with new retail, an enormous variety of dining, music venues and exciting nightlife destinations. It truly has been a testament to how the arts are a basic building block for a vibrant, diverse community.
In 2012, Robey and her daughter Julia Robey Christian co-founded the Anacostia Playhouse and in late-summer 2013 the venue opened its doors in the Anacostia Historic District. The theater at 2020 Shannon Place, SE, is located in a place of both rich history and great promise, much as H Street was when we opened there over a decade ago. As a full time facility we see ourselves as uniquely positioned to serve our local community east of the river, while we work to introduce the neighborhood to members of other communities, thereby helping spur local economic development. Our exciting programming and diverse audience base is part of the movement to restore nighttime vigor to Historic Anacostia. With ample parking and multiple transportation options, Anacostia is uniquely poised to house a thriving arts and entertainment community.
The Anacostia Playhouse is both a rental facility as well as a producing organization. Our mainstage has 100-120 seats with flexible, reconfigurable seating. We have already hosted such respected companies as Theater Alliance (our resident company), Verbal Gymnastics, Pinky Swear, Scena Theater, Restoration Stage and Southeast Trinity on our stage and look forward to housing many other producing entities. Ongoing outreach efforts have resulted in partnerships with Ballou High School, Thurgood Marshall Public Charter School and Young Playwrights Theatre, all of whom had productions in our space. Between mainstage productions we host readings of new plays, jazz concerts, fundraisers and more. With an additional multi-function space, we can host rehearsals and community meetings, and long range plans include a roster of after school and summer activities and a technical apprenticeship program.
Our Present and Our Future
We welcome your input. Please give us your suggestions about what you think we should consider offering, both on stage and off. And if you have a creative or technical resume, please send it along. We do contract hires for many productions as well as for after school teaching positions. You can email it to Stephawn Stephens at info@anacostiaplayhouse.com or drop it by.