Cheap theater: Where to enjoy affordable shows in NYC

The civic-minded Oskar Eustis is artistic director of this local institution dedicated to the work of new American playwrights but also known for its Shakespeare productions (Shakespeare in the Park). The building, an Astor Place landmark, has five stages, plays host to the annual Under the Radar festival, nurtures productions in its Lab series and is also home to the Joe’s Pub music venue.

Imported to the U.S. from Sweden in 1876, this venue is the coziest in all of NYC. Employing handmade marionettes and beautiful sets, the resident company mounts citified versions of well-known stories.

Visitors may think they know this venerable theater from TV’s Showtime at the Apollo. But as the saying goes, the small screen adds ten pounds: The city’s home of R&B and soul is actually quite cozy. Known for launching the careers of Ella Fitzgerald, Lauryn Hill and D’Angelo, among others at its legendary Amateur Night competition, the Apollo continues to mix veteran talents like Dianne Reeves with more contemporary acts like the Roots and Lykke Li. 

The grandest of the Lincoln Center buildings, the Met is a spectacular place to experience opera and ballet. The space hosts the Metropolitan Opera from September to May, with major visiting companies appearing in summer. The majestic theater also showcases works from a range of international dance companies, from the Paris Opéra Ballet to the Kirov Ballet. In spring, the Met is home to American Ballet Theatre, which presents full-length classic story ballets, works by contemporary choreographers and special performances and workshops for children. RECOMMENDED: 101 best things do in NYC

After a recent refurbishment, this downtown stalwart is now one of the most comfortable experimental spaces, what with its cozy lobby café (1 Dominick) and relatively impressive multimedia capacity. The upstairs space—long, wide and low—has played host to recent smashes like Taylor Mac’s epic The Lily’s Revenge, while the downstairs 70-seat black box sees new works by everyone from Karinne Keithley to Tina Satter. HERE’s strength lies in its come-one-come-all attitude, its absurdly generous grant and commissioning programs, and a genuine warmth that is largely thanks to the venue’s doyenne and founder, Kristin Marting, and the community of artists who call HERE a second home.

The adventurous theatergoer’s alternative to BAM, St. Ann’s Warehouse offers an eclectic lineup of theater and music; recent shows have included high-level work by the Wooster Group and National Theatre of Scotland. In 2015 it moved to the impressive Tobacco Warehouse, built in the 1870s as an inspection center for tobacco and newly renovated for theatrical use.

Steps on Broadway offers classes in many styles with some of the finest teachers in New York.

At this retro storefront theater, kids sit cross-legged on mats in front of the stage while grown-ups hunker down on bleachers behind them. All the productions, which are largely adaptations of well-known fairy and folk tales, are written by the theater’s artistic director, Nicolas Coppola.

Home to the megamusical Wicked, the Gershwin is one of those large barns (more than 1,800 seats) built in the 1970s. The lobby is in the Art Deco style. The space was rechristened after the great composer George Gershwin in 1983. It shares the buidling with Circle in the Square Theatre.

Walk into this revolution-red theater—with its narrow First Floor Theater, its spectacularly barnlike next-door Ellen Stewart Theatre and the groovy attic Club Theater—and you are transported back in time to the New York scene's ’60s heyday. The mama herself, the late Ellen Stewart, first opened La MaMa's doors in 1961; it has since produced major figures like Tadeusz Kantor, Andrei Serban and Ping Chong, along with younger multicultural, dance-theater and avant-garde artists.

Lincoln Center Theater's newest space is a 131-seat venue that will showcase new plays by rising talent under the LCT3 umbrella. The Tow is also the centerpiece of a 23,000-square-foot rooftop complex, designed by noted architect Hugh Hardy of H3 Hardy Collaboration Architecture, located on top of the Vivian Beaumont. The two-story structure (costing $41 million) also houses rehearsal and office space and includes an outdoor terrace overlooking the Lincoln Center Plaza.

The Tank, an adventurous multimedia performing-arts collaborative and talent incubator, spent years wandering from venue to venue, including a long stint in a small upstairs space on 46th Street. In 2017, it moved into the Midtown digs formerly occupied by Abingdon Theatre Company. Its two main spaces are the 98-seat June Havoc Theater and the 56-seat Dorothy Strelsin Theater. Meghan Finn is the company's longtime artistic director.

The Lyceum is Broadway's oldest continually operating legitimate space. Built by producer-manager David Frohman in 1903, it was purchased in 1940 by a conglomerate of producers which included George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart (co-authors of You Can't Take It with You and other comedies). In 1950, the Shuberts took ownership of the Lyceum, and still operate it. Alan Bates played the lovely 922-seat playhouse in John Osborne's Look Back in Anger (1957), and four years later, he returned in Harold Pinter's The Caretaker (1961). More recently, the venue was home to I Am My Own Wife and Neil LaBute's Reasons to Be Pretty.

Built in 1986, the Marquis is one of the newest Broadway houses. It's attached to the Marriott Marquis Hotel and, indeed, most of its occupant shows seem targeted to tourists. The venue has welcomed revivals (Gypsy, Damn Yankees, Annie Get Your Gun) and new work (Thoroughly Modern Millie, The Drowsy Chaperone). The Marquis has 1,611 seats and is one of the Nederlander's nine Broadway properties. The approach to the theater—via escalator—is unusual but rather grand. Even though the Marquis is bit barn-like, it has a spacious lobby, wide aisles and comfy seats.

This eco-conscious 90-seat rental and production space is a standout, with its stunning wood-and-concrete construction (oozing with green technologies), sweet art gallery and even—when do you rhapsodize about this downtown?—a wonderful bathroom. Since openig in 2007, it has hosted several notable works, including Samuel D. Hunter's A Bright New Boise and the musical 33 to Nothing.

The Roundabout Theatre Company's first Broadway property, this venue opened as the American Airlines Theatre the summer of 2000. Since then, it has been home to a series of revived classics (several by Shaw and Pinter) and golden-age musicals (The Pajama Game). Beautifully restored and redesigned in a pleasing red, gold and brown palette, the venue has comfortable seating and wide aisles (unlike many older spaces). In 2024, the theater was renamed in honor of the Roundabout's longtime artistic director and chief executive, Todd Haimes, who died in 2023.  

As well as the New York City Ballet (nycballet.com), the recently rechristened David H. Koch Theater is also home to the New York City Opera.

Soho Rep isn’t the last word in downtown experimental theater: Better than that, it’s often one of the first words, championing major voices at key points in their careers. Its astounding list of alums includes Richard Maxwell, Young Jean Lee, Adam Bock, Annie Baker, Nature Theater of Oklahoma, David Adjmi, Lucas Hnath, Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, Anne Washburn, Aleshea Harris and Jackie Sibblies Drury (whose Fairview, which premiered there, won the Pulitzer Prize). And Soho Rep’s low ticket prices, including 99¢ Sundays, help keep some of the city’s bravest, boldest and wildest theater within the reach of all New Yorkers. 

This chic, state-of-the-art venue, which comprises an Off Broadway space and two smaller theaters, is home to a lot of worthy programming, such as the annual Brits Off Broadway festival, which imports some of the U.K.’s best work for brief summer runs. The venue boasts three separate playing spaces. Theater A, on the ground floor, seats 196 people; upstairs are the 98-seat Theater B and a 70-seat black-box space, Theater C.

Camp is still in session at Abrons. However, there are COVID safety protocols. Masks must be worn at all times and everyone age 12 and older must show proof of vaccination. Campers will enjoy weekly water activities, weekly field trips, and will receive daily instruction in dance, music, theater, and visual arts.

The Gramercy looks exactly like what it is, a run-down former movie theater, yet it has a decent sound system and good sight lines. Concertgoers can lounge in raised seats on the top level or get closer to the stage. Family-friendly shows are rare but do occur occasionally.

This elegant theater at the Juilliard School hosts an outstanding variety of substantial concerts, most of them free or extremely affordable.

The intimate space, once a cinema, is a fine setting for dance. Of the 472 seats at the Joyce, there’s not a single bad one. Companies and choreographers who present work here, including Ballet Hispanico, David Parsons and Doug Varone, tend to be more conventional than experimental. The Joyce also hosts out-of-town crowd-pleasers like Pilobolus Dance Theatre. During the summer, when many theaters are dark, the Joyce continues its programming. At the Joyce Soho, emerging companies present work nearly every weekend. • Other location: Joyce Soho, 155 Mercer St between W Houston and Prince Sts (212-431-9233). Subway: B, D, F, M to Broadway–Lafayette St; N, R to Prince St; 6 to Bleecker St. $15–$20. Cash only.

In 1962, the reverend of St. Clement’s Episcopal Church entered into a rather unusual union of theater and religion that still holds tight today. Modeled after the guild chapels of 16th-century England, this 151-seat Off-Broadway house—which has been home to world premieres like Mamet’s American Buffalo, and companies like the New Group and Red Bull Theatre—still holds regular religious services. On Sundays, an altar is placed on the set of whatever production is currently running, and worship is conducted.

Opened in November 2009, this 17,000 square-foot venue serves as the performance space for the 52nd Street Project, a nonprofit theater company that invites industry pros to mentor Hells Kitchen kids.