Since 1938, friends, families and visitors to our community have been gathering at 22 Pleasant Street in Chester to experience movies, music, theatre and community events. A supportive and generous community has kept this jewel alive and thriving as an important arts venue on the south shore of Nova Scotia.
The building that is now known as the Chester Playhouse was built in 1938 and operated as the Kenerik movie house for many years. Starting in 1963, it was used as a venue for annual summer theatre productions by the Chester Jesters, but then sat unused until 1975, when it was purchased by Leo and Dora Velleman and Canadian Puppet Festivals. They used the building until merging with Mermaid Theatre in 1983.
Then, after a brief dormant period, the Chester Theatre Council brought the Playhouse to life again with the first Chester Summer Festival in 1987, a series of touring shows over an eight-week period. That fall, the building was purchased by Sir Christopher Ondaatje and renamed the Chester Playhouse. In 1992, he donated the Playhouse to the Chester Theatre Council, a registered charity with a volunteer Board of Directors that continues to operate the Playhouse today.
On June 11, 2021, weeks away from the completion of a Restoration Project, fire struck this beloved building, causing extensive damage to the roof and performance space. Thankfully, no one was hurt, and we remain grateful to the 18 fire departments from across the province that came together and worked so bravely to extinguish the fire with minimal damage to neighbouring buildings.
The Rebuild Project officially started in the Spring of 2022, and we really started to see progress as the summer began. Work continued throughout 2022 and into 2023, leading us to our Grand Re-Opening Celebration on August 26th, 2023!
The Playhouse in now better than ever, as our team worked hard to seize opportunities to make the building greener, more accessible, and better equipped than ever to meet the needs of today’s artists and audiences.
The Chester Playhouse continues to showcase established and emerging musicians, professional theatre, Hollywood, and independent films, and welcomes community talent to the stage.
