Aquila Theatre’s mission is to create bold reinterpretations of the classics for contemporary audiences. By expanding the canon and diversifying the classics, Aquila dares to change perceptions.
Aquila Theatre is one of the foremost producers of classical theatre. Since 1991, Aquila Theatre has been bringing world class actors, captivating designs, innovative adaptations and impactful direction to audiences across the globe. Aquila Theatre also provides extensive educational offerings and is an award winning leader in the field of public humanities programming.
Aquila Theatre Company was founded in London by Peter Meineck in 1991 with a production of Aeschylus’s Agamemnon at the Bridge Lane Theatre in London before touring in the United States to a few universities. The company, along with its founder moved to the United States in 1994, and in 1998, Aquila Theatre became a U.S. based non-profit theatre company. It went on to build up an extensive international touring circuit while becoming an established part of the New York City theater scene with its productions of Iliad: Book One at the Clark Studio at Lincoln Center, followed by long running Off-Broadway productions of Comedy of Errors and Much Ado About Nothing. Aquila has also had the pleasure of working with the acclaimed Olympia Dukakis and Louis Zorich in its 2004 production of Agamemnon.
Aquila is now one of the foremost producers of classical theater in the United States visiting 50 – 60 American cities per year with a program of two plays, workshops and educational programming, and is under the Artistic Directorship of Desiree Sanchez since 2012. The company has been awarded numerous grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, The National Endowment for the Humanities, from which it received a Chairman’s Special Award, the New York State Councils for the Arts and Humanities, and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. Aquila has performed at the White House under the Bush and Obama administrations, and has performed for the U.S Supreme Court and for the National Council on the Arts. Aquila was also recently invited by Lin-Manuel Miranda to perform at the U.S. Capitol in support of the National Endowment for the Humanities, for its groundbreaking theatre and humanities program: The Warrior Chorus.
