To donate or purchase tickets, contact

Stormfield Theatre
P.O. Box 80463
Lansing, MI 48908

or call Arts Tickets at 517.372.0945

(all major credit cards accepted)

Non-profit organizations exist to exhalt the human soul, to rescue it when needed, to make life better, healthier, worth living. Hospitals, schools, churches, the Salvation Army, the Girl Scouts — that's the work they do — they exist to change human experience for the better. And, by the way, the non-profits in this country are this country's largest employer. The not-for-profits are crucial to a functioning society.

The availability of arts and humanities to children, particularly those who are considered at risk, is critical. These at-risk children do not function well in the confines proscribed by institutional learning. In the 1994 "Coming Up Taller Report," commissioned by President William Clinton, Hillary Rodham Clinton, who served as honorary chair of the president's committee on the arts, said:

Too often today, instead of children discovering the joyful rewards of painting, or music, or sculpting, or writing or testing a new idea, they express themselves through acts of frustration, helplessness, hopelessness, even violence. We see too clearly how an erosion and a breakdown of our most cherished institutions have resulted in the fraying of the whole social fabric. We know that the arts have the potential for obliterating the limits that are too often imposed on our lives.

The arts are the most effective way of reaching across cultural borders, racial differences, generational misunderstandings. Commerce doesn't have any affect on these social ills. Government has a poor track record in giving comfort. But the arts make an inroad every time, because they alone approach our social structure from the inside out. The arts are a system that uses the individual to bring about social change for the sake of the community.

I've been speaking in general about the arts, and now I'd like to speak specifically about the theatre. Why is Stormfield, or any theatre, for that matter, important? The ancient Greeks understood it. The ancient Greeks, who created the concept of theatre, understood that this medium can provide the clarity that comes with profound understanding. You can only have profound understanding after you turn an idea over and contemplate its underbelly. Using the arena of the stage, we all come together in relatively small groups — live and in person — to examine one idea, a social construct, and truly decide what kind of people we want to be. Stormfield will serve Lansing, the state's capitol city. Mid Michigan can't be duplicated anywhere else in the world, nor can Lansing. This theater will reflect the life of this state and of this particular community. So I urge you to give now, and give generously.

Kristine Thatcher
Artistic Director
Stormfield Theatre