March 16, 2026
For more than three decades, the Beth Fowler School of Dance has brought its large-scale dance productions to the historic Egyptian Theatre stage, creating memorable performances for dancers, families, and the wider community. Known for productions that blend storytelling, choreography, and theatrical elements, the school continues to make the Egyptian its performance home each season. Egyptian Theatre Marketing Intern Myah Mackey connected with Beth Fowler, founder of the Beth Fowler School of Dance, to talk about the inspiration behind performing at the Egyptian, how she mentors young dancers, and what makes presenting their productions in a professional theatre setting so meaningful.
MYAH: What inspired you to choose the Egyptian Theatre as the home for your performances this season?
BETH: We started performing at the Egyptian Theatre in 1991 and have performed there ever since. We love how the Theatre has all our rotating Theatre Productions (over a dozen different productions) cues and lighting notes into their system. This allows us to bring a consistently high level of performance every time while allowing us to add things each time to make it even better each year. We do have a brand-new production, “VMA Legends” that we will present for the very first time this June! The Egyptian Theatre has technology capabilities that allows us to take our shows to the next level including their ability to present film and videos on the movie screens while our dancers dance.
M: How does performing in a historic venue like the Egyptian influence your choreography, staging, or overall production vision?
B: The technology capabilities are a big help to assure our visions come to life and do so consistently. But also, the historic decor makes the audience feel they are going to a professional ballet in Chicago…. not a high school auditorium which is a totally different experience.
M: What values guide the way you train and mentor your dancers at Beth Fowler School of Dance?
B: People can tell as soon as they visit our School of Dance that all our families are very warm and welcoming. We hear this all the time. Because dancers do tend to spend a lot of time at the dance studio it is important that the dancers and their families feel safe and welcome there. All the families are very supportive of one another. When everyone feels the success of learning dance skills correctly, this brings happiness and joy without a competitive atmosphere. There is a place for all at the Beth Fowler School of Dance, and everyone does well no matter their age or level, which provides such a warm and welcoming community of dance families.
M: How do you prepare your dancers both technically and emotionally for performing on larger stages?
B: Our Beth Fowler School of Dance dancers start to perform at age 3 at the Egyptian Theatre with a Big Sister Role Model that we assign to each of our preschool aged dancers. These “Big Sisters” are from our Dance Company (Beth Fowler Dance Company). This gives every young dancer the support and confidence needed to have many years of performing on a big stage! Those first experiences on stage with their one-on-one “Big Sister” are always great experiences that encourage them and they look forward to the next one!
We have technique classes always, and the younger dancers learn their dances to perform at the end of their technique classes. Our older dancers have full technique classes and rehearsals on a separate day. All technique for all dance styles comes from Ballet which we teach a lot of and put on the highest priority. All dancers need a lot of Ballet if they want to be trained well enough to succeed in any goal they may have for their futures. This includes dancing for their schools and/or colleges. Some high-level dance programs at colleges will not even consider dancers that did not continue technique classes throughout their high school years. So, we do everything we can to assure our dancers are prepared to reach their long-term goals, whatever they may be.
M: What does it mean to you to have your students showcase their work in a professional theatre setting rather than a traditional recital space?
B: It means everything…. we don’t put on “recitals” where dancers come out and perform dances back-to-back without a connection and without a story. We feel it is important that the dancers learn not only how to dance, but also how to perform a “Story” through emotion and storytelling through executed movements, props, backdrops, special effects and scenery sets. Our Stage Productions take the audiences on a journey which is more entertaining and magical for the audience while also making it a better experience for our dancers to learn the skills of telling a story through dance.
M: What do you hope audiences take away after watching a Beth Fowler School of Dance performance at the Egyptian Theatre?
B: I hope they see the huge difference in our shows and our trained dancers. I always love hearing the reactions from new dance families and from members of the community after they have seen their first Beth Fowler School of Dance, and Beth Fowler Dance Company Performance. They always say they were blown away and can’t wait for our next show! We are so proud of our dancers for being so amazingly talented and entertaining that they are bringing people to our shows that don’t even know any of the performers. They are bringing community members into our shows, that just want to see them dance! That is the most rewarding thing about our shows and our dancers.
