HISTORY: Founded in 1997 by artists David Feiner and Laura Wiley, Albany Park Theater Project has grown into a youth theater ensemble recognized for the excellence of both its artistic and youth development achievements. APTP's youth artists have collectively created more than fifty original works and performed for more than 25,000 audience members, at least half of whom identify themselves as first-time theatergoers. In addition to performances at its 100-seat home theater in Albany Park, the ensemble has performed at venues throughout Chicago and beyond, including the Athenaeum Theater, the Chicago Historical Society, the College of Wooster, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Northwestern University, the Storefront Theater, University of Chicago, University of Minnesota, and the Vittum Theater. With a focus on storytelling always its artistic hallmark, APTP has become ever more stylistically adventurous and imaginative over its 11-year history, honing its play development process, its sociopolitical acumen, and its skills as actors, dancers, musicians, ethnographers, and writers to tell the stories it collects with ever greater precision and power. APTP has been hailed as "one of the true theatrical treasures of Chicago" by the Chicago Sun-Times, been commissioned three times by the Chicago Humanities Festival, and featured in the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Chicago Magazine, Time Out Chicago, and on Chicago Public Television, Chicago Public Radio, and WGN-Radio. Through their work at APTP, 90% of the companys teen artists have developed the skills and ambition to become the first in their families to go to college. In 2004, APTP was honored by the Presidents Committee on the Arts and Humanities with the Coming Up Taller Award, recognizing outstanding achievement in celebrating the creativity of Americas young people and providing them with new learning opportunities and with opportunities to contribute to their communities. In 2006, APTP and co-founder Laura Wiley were featured in the WTTW documentary, "Beauty Rises: Four Lives in the Arts." In 2007, following the death of Laura Wiley, co-founder David Feiner was named Artistic & Executive Director.

MISSION: Albany Park Theater Project is a multiethnic, ensemble-based theater company of teens and young adults. APTP creates original performance works based on the real-life stories of immigrant and working-class Americans. Through the theater they create, artists at APTP tell stories from the margins of American life; provide a forum for exploring issues important to communities like Albany Park; enhance the vitality of their neighborhood and of Chicago's cultural landscape; showcase the ways in which young people and artists can change the world; and create a place where youth recognize and pursue their ability to lead ambitious, engaged lives.

Albany Park Theater Projects youth artists collectively write, choreograph, compose, and stage performance works based on the real-life stories of immigrant and working-class Chicagoans. Ensemble members nurture stories into performance through a play development process during which the ensemble analyzes the story and does research to situate it in a cultural, historical, and political context; considers multiple possible staging strategies; and devise text, choreography, and music. This process typically takes months or even years and involves several dozen youth artists and a handful of adult artists, with the ensemble frequently working on multiple projects simultaneously. APTP premieres a new production once a year with a debut run at The Laura Wiley Theater, our 100-seat, home theater in Albany Park. APTP also tours to theaters, universities, festivals, conferences, schools, and community sites throughout Chicago and beyond; Youth ensemble members think of APTP as a professional company and typically commit to the ensemble long-term, often arriving as freshmen in high school and remaining through graduation or beyond. While APTP requires a sustained and intense commitment and maintains high artistic standards, most teen ensemble members identify APTP as their first performing-arts experience. Teen ensemble members are paid a modest, weekly stipend. In 2007, APTP initiated a secondary focus on producing smaller scale performance events during the months when the ensemble is developing our mainstage. The goal is to make performing arts events a more frequent feature of Albany Parks landscape, and to give our audience members from all over Chicagoland more opportunities to spend an evening or afternoon at APTP. In its eleven-year history, APTP has also become known for the achievement of its teen artists off the stage. By becoming artists and witnessing the impact that their artistic work can have on people, teens discover that they can play an active and significant role in shaping their world. This discovery inspires them to envision and yearn for lives in which they continue the kind of meaningful work that they begin at APTP. Taken together, APTPs arts and youth development programming offers teens a home to come to more than 300 days a year. Youth development programs include: Theater Education Activities, through which youth ensemble members receive year-round theater and performance training; a book discussion group through which many teens become habitual readers for the first time; an annual artistic retreat that takes teen ensemble members to places of natural beauty to plan the coming year at APTP; mentoring; and a College Preparation and Planning Program through which more than 90% of ensemble members become the first in their families to attend college.