About The Broken Planetarium
The Broken Planetarium is a nonprofit theater company with a focus on creating new, imaginative theater that celebrates the collaboration between professional artists and people who have never had the chance to make theater before.
Our Mission
The Broken Planetarium is a nonprofit theater company with a focus on creating new, imaginative theater that celebrates the collaboration between professional artists and people who have never had the chance to make theater before.
Our Story
Laura Christina Dunn founded The Broken Planetarium in 2013 as a gathering where community members came together to make and share art, under the premise that everyone, no matter their background or education, should have access to artistic expression.
In 2014, Dunn brought her musical The Snow Queen: A Folk Opera to one gathering, and community members banded together to produce The Snow Queen for Fertile Ground 2015. From there, members were hooked on producing original musicals, and founding members Dunn and Kristine and Tim Falleta Abraldes formed The Broken Planetarium as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to providing access to theater making for everyone.
Productions provide access through community connections rather than auditions. We offer on the go education throughout the production as well as equal collaboration, where we strive for everyone’s ideas to be valued and held, no matter their experience or education. We also offer access through compensation for transportation, child care, food share, and we split the profits from every production among all the cast and crew, ensuring the maximum amount possible paid to our artists. Nothing is held for future productions, so grants and individual donations are our backbone financially.
The Broken Planetarium is unique in the theater community in that at least 50% of our cast and crew are new to theater, engaging with the medium with fresh eyes and voices. Because of this combination, our productions are enriched with innovation because we have collaborators with no hang up about what theater needs to be. Our compensation and funding model is also what makes this possible, uniquely offering financial accessibility to people normally not able to participate because of child care or other financial concerns.
Our Artistic Vision
The Broken Planetarium creates imaginative new theatre that uses familiar stories in unexpected ways. Drawing from mythology, literature, history, music, and folklore, TBP's productions explore contemporary questions about identity, community, environmental change, power, belonging, and the ways we relate to one another. The work is multidisciplinary and collaborative, bringing together theatre, original music, dance, visual art, poetry, and performance.
TBP also believes creativity should not belong only to people who already identify as professional artists. Its work creates opportunities for experimentation, collaboration, and participation while encouraging people to find and share their own creative voices.