Conceived over 60 years ago as one of the nation’s first nonprofit theaters, the Public has long operated on the principles that theater is an essential cultural force and that art and culture belong to everyone. Joe Papp, a Brooklyn-born child of Jewish immigrants from Russia, founded the New York Shakespeare Festival in 1954, at the age of 33, and later rented the former Astor Library from the city for $1 a year to start the Public, which transformed American theatre. Programming at the Public now includes an annual season of new work at its landmark home at Astor Place, Free Shakespeare in the Park at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park, the Mobile Unit touring throughout New York City’s five boroughs, Public Lab, Public Works, Public Shakespeare Initiative, and the cabaret space Joe’s Pub.
