Illinois Shakespeare Festival Summer Camps and Classes

Illinois Shakespeare Festival Summer Camps and Classes offers summer camps and classes that include Bard Buddies: Elementary, Shakespeare’s Apprentices: Middle School, Shakespeare’s Players: High School, Broadway Basics: Musical Theatre Camp (Middle School), and Broadway Dreamers: Musical Theatre Camp (High School). Bard Buddies participants discover who William Shakespeare was, meet fairies, ghosts, witches, bears, and more, and create and explore the power of storytelling through crafts and activities. Shakespeare’s Apprentices and Shakespeare’s Players focus on theatre skills such as character work, Shakespeare’s text, stage combat, movement, and voice, and on collaborating as a company to produce a one-act version of a Shakespeare play, which is shared in a public performance. Broadway Basics and Broadway Dreamers focus on musical theatre performance skills through group numbers, solos, and duets, character development, acting the song, musicianship, healthy choral singing, and choreography, leading to a cabaret performance of musical theatre numbers for friends and family.

• Ages: 8–17 years old
• Schedule: Bard Buddies runs one week, July 6–10, Monday–Friday, 9 a.m.–11 a.m.; the middle school and high school Shakespeare camps run three weeks, July 13–31, Monday–Friday, 9 a.m.–noon; the middle school and high school musical theatre camps run three weeks, July 13–31, Monday–Friday, 1 p.m.–4 p.m.; students enrolled in both a morning camp and an afternoon camp are supervised during the lunch break.
• Price: Bard Buddies costs $125 per student; Shakespeare’s Apprentices and Shakespeare’s Players each cost $275 per student; Broadway Basics and Broadway Dreamers each cost $275 per student, or $175 if the student is also enrolled in one of the morning camps; limited scholarships are available.

The Illinois Shakespeare Festival launched its Summer Camps for Youth program in 2017, building on a history as a professional repertory company established in 1978 and supported by the Illinois Shakespeare Festival Society, founded in 1983. The Festival produces mainstage productions, free family-friendly performances, Theatre for Young Audiences shows, and community events over the summer, and reaches over 10,000 patrons each season. The camps and classes are part of a larger organization that also includes a touring Bard in a Box troupe that brings Shakespearean adaptations to schools and community centers, and internships for college students from across the country in areas ranging from acting to stage management.

The Illinois Shakespeare Festival Summer Camps and Classes are led and supported by the Illinois Shakespeare Festival leadership team, which includes Artistic Director Robert Quinlan, Producer Ann Haugo, Budget Manager Marty Lynch, Production Manager Allie Nicholson, Dramaturg Kee-Yoon Nahm, Personnel and Communications Manager Natasha Warloe, Center for the Performing Arts Manager Nick Benson, and Scott Irelan, Dean of the Wonsook Kim College of Fine Arts. Teaching staff for the camps include Dr. Jimmy Chrismon, a member of the theatre teacher education faculty at Illinois State University with 17 years of experience teaching high school theatre and experience as an actor and director, along with Illinois State University theatre education students Grace Borre, Nina Falco, Lucas Suchor, and Izzy Wilson. Maximum enrollment is 15 students for Bard Buddies and 25 students each for Shakespeare’s Apprentices, Shakespeare’s Players, Broadway Basics, and Broadway Dreamers, and family and friends are invited to attend the public performances and cabaret events during the last week or last day of the camps.

Last updated May 24, 2026.