72 E. 11th Ave

In the Acting bachelor’s degree program at Columbia College Chicago, you’ll gain hands-on experience in a diverse range of productions and develop professional skills to help you launch a career in theatre, film, or television. You’ll learn an approach to performance that asks actors to contemplate motive and fully experience the characters they play. To this approach, we add physical theatre, viewpoints, stage combat, and on-camera techniques. You’ll collaborate on new work with other theatre artists to create performances that are fresh and innovative. You’ll also take professional workshops covering topics like auditioning, working with agents, evaluating opportunities, and navigating contracts and union representation.

Gain experience and build a diverse resume in the Musical Theatre programs at Columbia College Chicago. Our programs are designed to help you succeed in a competitive industry by fostering concrete professional skills with a variety of performance experiences. As a Musical Theatre major, you’ll receive the education you’ll need to become a multifaceted performer and theatre professional. We stage 40 productions a year, and encourage new students to audition right away for musicals and nonmusical productions. Many Columbia Musical Theatre majors perform in student films, devised productions, and off-campus productions. You’ll become adept at auditioning, learn about the business side of theatre, and develop transferable skills applicable to many professions.

As a leader behind the scenes, you have the vision and initiative to organize and manage a production from beginning to end. In the Theatre bachelor’s degree program at Columbia College Chicago, you’ll start by getting a solid education in theatre history and theory, and then choose a concentration in directing, playwriting, or stage management. Our practice-based curriculum is designed to give you experience leading teams and working through real challenges with faculty mentors. Great leaders in theatre are well-rounded. The program brings three key leadership roles together in practice: the writer, the director, and the stage manager. Designed to mirror the theatre industry, your courses will give you experience across disciplines, allowing you to build strong working relationships with different kinds of theatre professionals.

You’ll study all aspects of the creation of theatre and live performance in the Theatre Design and Technology bachelor’s degree program at Columbia College Chicago. The program emphasizes design as a collaborative process that requires close cooperation among directors, designers, technical teams, and performers. You can explore many interests or choose from advanced courses to focus on a single area of design and production. No matter what path you choose, you’ll get experience across disciplines. You’ll build a strong foundation that will prepare you to collaborate with different kinds of theatre professionals. You’ll take courses in set, lighting, costume, and sound design to gain hands-on experience creating theatre in many genres and styles. Our Theatre Department stages 40 theatrical productions a year, and Theatre Design and Technology majors are always behind the scenes. You’ll learn the professional approaches and standards of the field as you work on projects ranging from black-box productions to main stage productions, which are directed by faculty members and guest artists. You’ll have opportunities to work as a designer, technician, running crew member, scenic painter, makeup artist, and sound engineer.

Explore comedy across platforms in Columbia College Chicago’s top-ranked Comedy Writing and Performance bachelor’s degree program. With a strong emphasis on writing, the program pushes you to take creative risks and experiment regularly, giving you space to hone your creative voice. By the time you graduate, you’ll be ready for a career in comedy. We’ll train you in every aspect of comedy performance and production, giving you lots of opportunities to write and perform. You’ll gain a solid foundation in theory. Through a series of readings, screenings, lectures, and discussions, you’ll study what makes us laugh and why it makes us laugh. You’ll also study the role of comedy in society and the ways it functions in satire, taboo, stereotype, and archetype. You’ll join a vibrant community of students passionate about comedy who revel in the rush of making people laugh.

The 181-seat Courtyard Theater has intimate seating and a second-story balcony overlooking the stage. A catwalk and motorized line sets allow for flexible lighting capabilities. Backstage doorways lead to dressing and makeup rooms, and a 16-foot pass-through door allows set pieces to be rolled directly on stage from the scene shop.

The Classic Theater is a traditional black box space: It’s flexible, allowing students to experiment with audience seating and dynamic design. Depending on set-up, the space can seat up to 75 people.

This larger black box allows a greater level of production work, both with inventory of lighting and scenic elements. Students direct, produce, and act in more advanced projects here.

Our largest black box space is especially well-suited for multimedia projects and allows for flexibility to build immersive and unique sets and innovative lighting and sound designs.

With plenty of workspace for students, the costume shop has industrial sewing machines, as well as tools to press, alter, and dye. This space also houses hundreds of garments from different time periods. A costume borrowing shop next-door allows students to check out pieces for their independent projects or coursework. The prop shop houses furniture, rugs, lamps, and other important scenic elements as well as hundreds of props. The props are available for students to check out for their independent projects or coursework.

A dedicated space for learning and designing theatre lighting allows students to experiment with cutting-edge LED and moving light technologies and consoles, as well as traditional lighting for a variety of live performance events, including theatre, concerts, and dance.

A large and brightly lit makeup and prosthetics lab provides students ample space to learn a variety of techniques for theatre, film, TV, and avant-garde. Dedicated sinks and counters allow for immersive hands-on classes. You’ll also learn the safety protocols required for a variety of materials, including latex, foam, and silicone.

Our state-of-the-art scene shop has all the tools and equipment you'll need to design, construct, and assemble sets. The space can be reconfigured to accommodate individual construction projects. Students learn proper techniques for using a variety of tools, including saws, miters, drill presses, and sanders. A state-of-the-art dust collection and particulate filtration system assures safety. The shop is also equipped with a large paint frame, lit with warm LED lighting for painting back-drops. A 16-foot-tall load door allows the production teams to roll set pieces directly onto the Courtyard Theater stage. And, a plate glass window between the shop build space and the lobby allows students to showcase their work as it's being constructed, giving patrons a glimpse behind the scenes.