REUNION PHOTO VIA ORLANDO FAMILY STAGE
Orlando Family Stage (Website) is launching two new efforts to reconnect with the artists, staff, and audiences who have helped to shape the theatre over its nearly 100-year history, as part of its ongoing centennial celebration.
The first effort is being called History Harvest, a free community archiving event set for Sunday, September 27, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., held in partnership with the University of Central Florida’s RICHES Digital Archiving Project. The second is The Green Room, a season-long series of designated performances throughout the 2026-2027 season inviting alumni and the broader Orlando theatre community back to see the work.
Both initiatives grow out of the theatre’s 100 Year Reunion, which was held in February and brought generations of artists and staff together for the first time in decades. And the Orlando Family Stage team has been stoked ever since.
History Harvest invites anyone connected to the theatre, whether on stage, backstage, in the classroom or in the audience, to bring photographs, playbills, and other memorabilia to be professionally digitized on the spot, with original items returned to their owners the same day. Oral historians will also be recording interviews throughout the event, and attendees are encouraged to bring a friend or former castmate to help spark shared memories (and keep your stories more accountable).
Contributions will join thousands of items already preserved in the Orlando Family Stage Collection, which the RICHES team is digitizing for the RICHES Mosaic Interface, a free online resource that makes Central Florida history accessible to students, families and researchers. UCF History Department Associate Professor Dr. Connie L. Lester, who directs the RICHES project, said the team is glad to take part in the theatre’s centennial and encouraged people to sign up for oral history interviews.
Tickets and details for both History Harvest and The Green Room are available HERE.
