The Improvised Shakespeare Company Returns to Kennedy Center

The Kennedy Center's Theater Lab will welcome The Improvised Shakespeare Company for a five-week run from November 28 through December 23, 2025, bringing the Chicago-born improv phenomenon back to DC just in time for the holidays. The run is part of the Center's 2025-26 theater lineup and places the troupe in its ideal intimate setting, where audience suggestions can ricochet into full-blown Elizabethan plots at hilarious speed.

The Improvised Shakespeare Company at The Kennedy Center in DC

If you’ve never seen them, here’s the treasured trick: at the top of each performance, the cast asks the crowd for a title that Shakespeare never wrote. From that single suggestion they invent an entirely new “lost” play—complete with lovers and villains, asides and swordfights, and those satisfying rhyming couplets—composed on the spot and spoken as if inked by the Bard himself. Nothing is scripted, and even the performers don’t know where the story is headed until it arrives. The Kennedy Center describes the format simply—“based on one audience suggestion”—and Folger Shakespeare Library recently profiled how creator Blaine Swen and company use a loose structure and deep knowledge of Shakespearean rhetoric to spin coherent, exhilarating narratives out of thin air.

Founded in Chicago in 2005, The Improvised Shakespeare Company cut its teeth at iO Theater and now maintains a thriving home base in both Chicago and Los Angeles while touring widely. Along the way, the ensemble has become one of the most acclaimed improv outfits on the circuit, appearing at major festivals and cultural institutions—including repeat visits to the Kennedy Center—while cultivating a rotating company of quick-witted performers with Second City pedigrees and a sincere love of Shakespeare.

DC audiences know them well. When the troupe last played the Theater Lab, local and national outlets praised the miracle they pull off nightly: critics marveled at the cast’s musicality with language and the way intricate plots seem to crystallize in real time—an experience that’s both rowdy and remarkably faithful to Shakespeare’s spirit. Reviews across several seasons have highlighted the same alchemy: a genuine command of verse unlocked by fearless, generous improv.

For this 2025 engagement, performances are scheduled throughout the run at the Theater Lab (2700 F St NW). The show clocks in at about 90 minutes and is recommended for mature audiences, an advisory that reflects the free-wheeling, anything-can-happen nature of the comedy rather than any set content.

Because every night is a world premiere—and also a closing night—no two visits are the same. That makes this return a particularly appealing pick for theatregoers who like to bring friends back for seconds, or for Shakespeare lovers eager to see how deeply the canon can be playfully reimagined. And for audiences discovering the company for the first time, the thrill is immediate: you watch gifted actors listen fiercely, build verse, and conjure characters with Shakespearean desires, then collide those desires until a fresh tragedy, comedy, or romance emerges before your eyes. As the Folger piece notes, the company treats the Bard seriously enough that the laughs land harder—and the stories surprise more—precisely because the poetry feels real.

If you’re planning a holiday outing or entertaining family in from out of town, this is an easy recommendation: a fast, funny, and utterly one-of-a-kind night that celebrates Shakespeare while inviting you to help title the show.