:: About Us: Mission

Echo is an ensemble driven theatre company that champions bold, contemporary works and rediscovers rarely produced classics that provoke, excite and entertain.

Three ongoing components:

• Echo champions the visions of bold new writers and theatre artists from around the globe, by producing their works in full-scale, professional productions and introducing their plays in free, monthly readings. 
• Echo rediscovers rarely produced classics which resonate in contemporary and unexpected ways.  These are plays that people in the St. Louis community may have read, studied or heard of, but are not performed in the area.
• Echo develops and nurtures new theatre audiences and artists through the Imagination over Limitations children’s hospital outreach, the Next Generation programs, and educational training and internships.

Echo has a reputation for daring, visceral and arresting work that combines strong ensemble acting, vivid storytelling and intelligent text.  We believe that, in the best of circumstances, a sharing occurs between the actors and the audience that leads to a form of awareness for all participants. As an ensemble, we continually seek to strengthen this sharing in hopes that the relationship created in the theatre will resonate from the audience to the community. This resonation correlates directly to the “echo” for which we are named. 

Through our productions, readings, outreach, training and workshops, Echo hopes to build a community around theatre that is brave, humorous, intelligent, political, and asks more of all of us. We envision Echo as the meeting place where a diverse, energized community has investment, ownership and representation.  The company pushes the boundaries of live performance and encourages artists – and their audiences – to explore new ideas and take artistic risks which most commercial venues are not able to afford.  We provide artists with rare opportunities to develop their skills, vision and craft, and then share their work with the community through professional productions.  In our theatre:  views are challenged; people gather in celebration; voices are lifted; and we all leave the theatre differently from when we entered.