Please support our end of year campaign to raise $40,000 by June 30th.

“I strongly believe that the work of independent artists, and the opportunity to gather in time and space around complex and difficult artistic questions, is critically important during times of crisis.”

I wrote this sentence for a recent grant proposal; upon reflection, it’s as true a collection of words as I could hope to write.

I understand (and in my darker moments, fully share) the impulse to retreat, to self-soothe, to wrap myself in the world’s largest security blanket of distraction. But I know in my gut that the only path forward is through. Everything feels risky now; the only response I can muster is MORE RISK, AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.

This is the very reason that The Chocolate Factory Theater came into being, and why it must continue to exist.

If you’re looking to explain or justify or rationalize the quixotic and chaotic fairy tale of the scrappy / experimental not-for-profit performance space — and The Chocolate Factory has lived this story for more than twenty years — MORE RISK would be the tagline. The words MORE RISK will be etched into our tombstone.

The Chocolate Factory Theater is one of the few remaining spaces devoted to this weird, brave, boundary-expanding work by dance, theater, interdisciplinary-and-everything-in-between artists. We’re holding it down for a community at serious risk, whose unsurprising answer to the storm of uncertainty is MORE RISK PLEASE.

If this sounds daunting, or depressing, to you — it really isn’t. This is how we meet the moment: by looking ourselves in the mirror, and calling out the elephant(s) in the room, and finding new cliffs to leap from, and gathering together face to face in left-of-center spaces such as ours, where the risk is the entire point, and the path forward, and the reward.

In the words of Board Member (and Fall 2025 Season artist — you heard it here first!) Neil Greenberg: “What do I love about the Chocolate Factory Theater? It is an artist centered ethos and environment. The curator is an artist. The tech director is an artist. The staff are all artists. When you perform there, artists are literally given keys to the space. This shows a trust in artists and art. A trust in the artist to make the work that is right for them to make at that moment in time. I have seen so many great shows at the Chocolate Factory Theater. And they have been great because of risk-taking. Exciting shows. Unsettling shows. Troubling shows, beautiful, gorgeous shows, problematic shows, inspiring shows.”

Like many if not most of our peers, The Chocolate Factory Theater has lost significant funding in recent months. Yet our work remains critically important. The artists whose work and lives we are committed to support, in deeply personal and (we hope) lasting and meaningful ways, are critically important. But our continued existence is hardly guaranteed.

We depend, now more than ever, on the generous support of individuals like you. If you can, please consider a gift of any size that feels meaningful to you. Your generosity is profoundly impactful — it directly sustains groundbreaking artistic practices, provides resources and opportunities to independent artists, and keeps our shared community connected through work that’s increasingly at risk just as it embraces risk.