Steppenwolf Theatre Wraps 50th Anniversary Season, From Highland Park Basement to World Stage

Steppenwolf Theatre Company is closing out its 50th anniversary season this month, marking five decades since a handful of theater-obsessed teenagers in Highland Park decided they wanted to put on some plays.

The company, now headquartered in Lincoln Park, has spent the season looking back on that beginning while its current leaders talk about what comes next. Founding member Gary Sinise said the group never set out to build an institution. "In the beginning it was just kids wanting to do plays. We loved it, and it grew and grew," Sinise said. "The next thing you know, 50 years down the road, and it developed into something pretty special."

Steppenwolf started in 1976, formed by Sinise, Jeff Perry and Terry Kinney along with other young actors who couldn't get cast anywhere else and decided to cast themselves instead. The company eventually moved from the Highland Park church basement where it began into Chicago proper, building a reputation for raw, physical performances rooted in ensemble work that stood apart from more traditional stagecraft. Laurie Metcalf, another original member, said the operation used to be small enough that everyone involved knew every detail of the work. "It started off just being so tiny and just about the actors. The footprint of that is now way bigger," Metcalf said. "It's an integral part of Chicago. In my small role I played in it, I feel really proud about that."

That early scrappiness bred a kind of loyalty among the founders that Perry described as almost defiant. "These roots were deep, we got a kick out of each other, we were our only friends. We had 'us against the world' mentality," Perry said. "We're gonna change the face of American theatre. I don't remember saying it, but I can imagine the arrogance of saying that."

Steppenwolf productions have transferred to Broadway repeatedly over the decades, and the company has won a Tony Award for regional theater along with a long list of other honors. Its rosters have included Sinise, Metcalf, John Malkovich, Joan Allen and Gary Cole, actors who went on to build major film and television careers while maintaining ties to the ensemble that trained them.

The theater is now led by artistic directors Glenn Davis and Audrey Francis, who took over in 2021 as the first co-leadership team in the company's history and the first artistic directors of color at Steppenwolf. Davis said the company grew from a handful of friends in Highland Park into an internationally recognized company because its work connected with Chicago audiences before it drew attention elsewhere. "We just wanted to make something beautiful for Chicago audiences, we did that and New York came calling," Davis said. "To be doing this with artists of color is hugely monumental and a profound joy to be part of this journey. These things have come together in perfect harmony. We owe a debt of gratitude to those amazing artists. They started out in high school and college just doing plays. They cast themselves because other folks wouldn't."

Francis, who came up through Chicago's storefront theater scene before joining Steppenwolf, said the company's connection to local audiences shaped everything that followed. "Chicago audiences were the water to our garden," Francis said. "I came up in Chicago theatre. My dream was, how can I be on Steppenwolf's stage one day." She said she now thinks about the actors working in Chicago's smaller theaters today the way she once thought about herself. "I know that those actors are out there in Chicago today, and my biggest dream is to make sure there is space for them to be sitting here with you in 20 years, so that this ensemble mentality and Steppenwolf brand continues for another 50."

Steppenwolf's Lincoln Park campus, on North Halsted Street, has expanded over the years to include multiple stages, including the in-the-round Ensemble Theater in the Ellen Stone Belic Institute building that opened in 2021. The company runs an active new-work development program alongside its main stage productions and maintains an ensemble membership that now numbers several dozen artists, including actors, directors and playwrights who work elsewhere but return to Steppenwolf as their artistic home base.

Founding members have appeared alongside Davis and Francis at events throughout the anniversary season to mark the milestone. Davis and Francis have not announced specific programming for next season, but both said expanding opportunities for artists of color and younger Chicago talent will remain a priority as the company plans its next chapter on Halsted Street.