The Shakespeare Center Of Los Angeles

For more than of a quarter century, The Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles (SCLA) has presented fully professional productions of Shakespeare’s plays featuring world-class actors in locations throughout Greater Los Angeles. The Shakespeare Center also provides nationally replicated, best practice, model educational enrichment programs for youth that have earned the highest awards and accolades. Since its 1986 inception, SCLA’s art has been intrinsically linked with tangible social benefits. It’s Food for Thought admission policy is responsible for collecting more than $2 million in foodstuffs for the needy in lieu of admission charge to fully-professional productions of Shakespeare’s plays. The White House recognized SCLA with a Coming Up Taller Award for its eighteen-year old Will Power to Youth evidence-based, arts employment and academic enrichment initiative as a national model for youth development. The Shakespeare Center’s reputation for creating excellent art is supported by data that describes tangible benefits of arts engagement. Harvard’s Ash Institute, located within Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government designated Will Power to Youth as one of the nation’s “Top 50 Programs.” Another of Harvard’s prestigious research institutes, Project Zero, selected the company as a case study for its national report Qualities of Quality: Understanding Excellence in Arts Education. SCLA’s work has served as a catalyst for an Inter-Agency Agreement between the National Endowment for the Arts and U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention to pilot arts programming in communities federally designated for Gang Reduction, Intervention and Prevention. The company’s founder Ben Donenberg was appointed by President George W. Bush to the National Council on the Arts, overseeing the National Endowment for the Arts. (Note: SCLA was formerly named Shakespeare Festival/LA, Inc.; the name was legally changed in 2010.)