Only in Baltimore would Shakespeare get a bank vault for a dressing room. The Chesapeake Shakespeare Company — the largest classics theatre in Maryland — performs in a gloriously restored 1885 bank building downtown, where marble columns, a soaring skylit hall and the original vault frame some of the most joyful Shakespeare in America.
Founded in 2002, the company built its following with energetic outdoor summers at the Patapsco Female Institute ruins in Ellicott City before opening its Calvert Street home in 2014. Inside, thrust staging puts the audience on three sides of the action, and the company’s education programs introduce thousands of Maryland students to live Shakespeare every year.
Banker’s hours never looked this fun.
Chesapeake Shakespeare Company is at 7 South Calvert Street. Season at chesapeakeshakespeare.com.
