Overview: Change Capital Grant Program

At the Sheri and Les Biller Family Foundation, we hold a firm belief in the power of live theatre to spark dialogue, open doors for challenging conversations, shift perspectives, and inspire civic engagement. Because we believe in the potential live theatre has to create positive change in our communities, we feel deeply invested in the health and sustainability of the theatre ecosystem.

Coming out of the pandemic, after many conversations with grantee partners sharing with us the challenges of a rapidly changing sector, we knew a few things to be true: first, that each theatre with whom we spoke knew that traditional theatre models needed to change, and second, that there was neither the breathing room nor the budget margins to dream up, let alone implement those changes.

In response, in Summer of 2024, we designed and launched our Change Capital Grant Program and selected six theatres to receive awards, each working to implement a new business model and each united by a commitment to try something new in service of their mission, their community, and the sustainability of the theatre sector.

One of the Foundation’s primary goals through this grant program, in addition to building a cohort of leaders to support each other in their change work, was to learn alongside our grantee partners and to share these learnings with the field. In July 2026, we published a collection of case studies diving into the cohort member projects — what they are learning, discovering, working through, and celebrating. You can download the full resource here. You can also hear directly from grantees about their work here.