The Empty Space’s mission is to provide professional quality live theatre to the community of Bakersfield and to create an opportunity for local actors, directors and technicians to work in a creative environment that allows them to express themselves and their artistic ideas while encouraging them to continue to study and improve their craft.  The Empty Space offers free theatre to the community of Bakersfield.  Any member of the community who wants to experience live theatre, regardless of his or her financial situation, is able to do just that at The Empty Space.  Every show produced by The Empty Space furthers that mission and purpose.

The concept of “Setting Theatre Free” has everything to do with you. Without an audience, there is no live theatre. And so we invite you to come for free. We ask you to pay at the end of the performance, and we encourage you to give what you can. But we also don’t want to discourange you from seeing theatre, so even if you can’t pay we still want you here. Help us fill “The Empty Space” by telling your friends and family and neighbors and co-workers and anyone else who you think would enjoy our shows. Without an audience, live theatre dies. We need you to help us keep it alive.

Running a theatre is expensive, and very few theatres are able to survive on ticket prices alone. We hope to survive by the generosity of our patrons. We ask minimum donation of 5$ for students and $10 for adults, which is comparable to most other theatres in town, and a lot less expensive than theatre’s outside of our area. If you have other ways you might be able to help us, either through donations of money, time or energy, or ideas on how to generate revenue, please let us know by phone or email at executive@esonline.org.