A scene from "A Midsummer Night's Dream: The Best Bits"
The Ellis Theatre Guild was created in 1979 by the establishment of the Ellis Dramatics Fund through the pledge of an annual donation from Mr. and Mrs. Michael Ellis. The Guild presents a musical (winter) and non-musical (spring) theatre production each year. With the inception of
Hill on Tour! during the 2008-09 school year, the Guild also presents a children's theatre touring production. Smaller student productions began in in the black box
CAVE Theatre in 2007.
Since its inception, the Guild has produced two to three plays each year, first in Memorial Hall, which occupied the main floor of the library until it was razed in 1989 to make way for extensive renovations to the Library. Upon completion of the Center For The Arts in that same year, the Guild relocated to the Center Theatre where its plays now are produced. Since 1989, the Guild has mounted more than 30 full-length and one-act plays.
Plays have included the following titles, among many others:
- A Midsummer Night's Dream: The Best Bits, May 2011
- Beauty and the Beast, February 2011
- The Good Times Are Killing Me, May 2010
- Into The Woods, February 2010
- Steel Magnolias, May 2009
- Bye Bye Birdie, February 2009
- The Importance of Being Earnest, May 2008
- Kiss Me Kate, February 2008
- Babel's in Arms, December 2007
- Ali Baba and the Magic Cave
- The Diviners, February 2007
- The Fantasticks, February 2007
- Godspell, May 2007
- Robin Hood, Fall 2007
- Fortinbras, February 2006
- A Thurber Carnival, November 2005
- Festival of Short Plays, Winter 2005
- A Murder is Announced, February 2004