Live audio described theater performances through August 2026
Please come to the exciting live theater productions with audio description (AD). Preshow description of sets and costumes begins 30 minutes prior to curtain. Arrive early to allow time to get headsets, programs, and to be seated. Many performances feature touch tours prior to the show. Check with the specific theater to confirm details for touch tours.
The following audio described performances will be at the designated theatres listed below. Enjoy these accessible theater opportunities!
Kinky Boots
Audio described: Sunday, February 22, 2026, 1:00 PM
Kinky Boots is Broadway’s huge-hearted, high-heeled hit! With songs by Grammy® and Tony®-winning pop icon Cyndi Lauper, this joyous musical celebration is about the friendships we discover, and the belief that you can change the world when you change your mind. Inspired by true events, Kinky Boots takes you from a gentlemen’s shoe factory in Northampton to the glamorous catwalks of Milan. Charlie Price is struggling to live up to his father’s expectations and continue the family business of Price & Sons. With the factory’s future hanging in the balance, help arrives in the spectacular form of Lola, a fabulous performer in need of some new stilettos. Kinky Boots is the winner of six Tony Awards, including Best Musical, Best Score and Best Choreography. Take a step in the right direction and discover that sometimes the best way to fit in is to stand out.
Location: Citizens Opera House, 539 Washington Street, Boston
Stomp
Audio described: Sunday, February 22, 2026, 1:00 PM
Stompis explosive, inventive, provocative, witty, and unique—this international percussion sensation has garnered armfuls of awards and rave reviews. The eight-member troupe uses everything but conventional percussion instruments – matchboxes, wooden poles, brooms, garbage cans, Zippo lighters, hubcaps – to fill the stage with magnificent rhythms. See what all the noise is about.
Location: Hanover Theater, 2 Southbridge Street, Worcester, MA
The Things Around Us
Audio described: Sunday, February 22, 2026, 2:00 PM
The Things Around Us is a funny, and introspective new work from acclaimed musician, artist, and storyteller Ahamefule J. Oluo. In this one-person show, Oluo builds layers of live, looped music and then tells us revealing, personal stories to create a thought-provoking evening about strangers, acquaintances, and friends—and how all three might be more similar to each other than we often think. Using trumpet, vocals, cardboard shipping boxes for drums, and other instruments, Oluo creates an expansive symphony that becomes the perfect soundtrack to their reflections, laugh out loud stories, and universal observations about life.
Location: Paramount Center – RJO Mainstage, 559 Washington Street, Boston
We Had A World
Audio described: Saturday March 7, 2026, 2:00 PM
A dying woman calls her grandson and asks him to write a play about their family. “But I want you to promise me something,” she says. “Make it as bitter and vitriolic as possible.” In this searing, funny, and deeply personal play, the author of Prayer for the French Republic recreates thirty years of family fights, monstrous behavior, enduring love, and unexpected dishes of home-cooked spaetzle.
Location: The Huntington Calderwood Pavilion, 527 Tremont Street, Boston
Dead as a Dodo
Audio described: Sunday, March 8, 2026, 2:00 PM
An uplifting musical odyssey into the heart of friendship and the underworld with your tour guides: an extinct dodo and a skeleton boy. Deep within the underworld, a skeleton Dodo and boy dig daily for fresh bones to replace their deteriorating ones, desperately trying to keep from disappearing. But one day, the Dodo miraculously sprouts feathers–and everything changes. The transformation sends the two friends into a chaotic journey as they flee the wrath of the Skeleton King and fight to stay together. From Wakka Wakka, Dead as a Dodo is an inspirational musical odyssey about true friendship and the will to survive against all odds.
Location: Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, 219 Tremont Street, Boston
The Antiquities
Audio described: Tentative dates: Saturday, March 14, 2026, 2:00 PM, & Thursday, March 19, 2026, 7:00 PM
Written by Jordan Harrison, The Antiquities tells the story in the not-so-distant future, of a team of curators at the Museum of Late Human Antiquities painstakingly reconstructing the past: vinyl records, yoga mats, even grief itself. But as their exhibit grows, so do the cracks in their understanding of what it meant to be human.
Location: Speakeasy Stage, Calderwood Pavilion, Boston Center for the Arts, 527 Tremont St., Boston MA
Suffs
Audio described: Sunday, March 22, 2026, 1:00 PM
Direct from Broadway, comes the acclaimed Tony Award®-winning musical Suffs about the brilliant, passionate, and funny American women who fought tirelessly for the right to vote. Created by Shaina Taub, the first woman to ever independently win Tony Awards for Best Book and Best Score in the same season, this thrilling, inspiring and dazzlingly entertaining new musical boldly explores the triumphs and failures of a struggle for equality that’s far from over. Winner of the Outer Critics’ Circle Award for Best New Musical.
Location: Emerson Colonial Theatre, 106 Boylston Street, Boston
Honk!
Audio described: Friday, March 27, 2026, 7:00 PM, Saturday, March 28, 2026, 1:00 PM, & Sunday, March 29, 2026, 1:00 PM
Honk! is a musical adaptation of the 1843 Hans Christian Andersen story “The Ugly Duckling,” incorporating a message of tolerance. The book and lyrics are by Anthony Drew and music by George Stiles. The musical is set in the countryside and features Ugly – a cygnet who is mistaken as an ugly duckling upon falling into his mother’s nest and is rejected by everyone but Ida, his mother, a sly tomcat who only befriends him out of hunger, and several other barnyard characters.
Location: R.J. Grey Junior High School, 16 Charter Rd, Acton
In Old Age
Audio described: Sunday, March 29, 2026, 2:00 PM
& Friday, April 3, 2026, 8:00 PM
Play 8 of the Ufot Family Cycle. In a house filled with memory, an unexpected bond brings healing, hope, and the courage to move on. Abasiama Ufot, still living in the house of her deceased husband, forms an unexpected spiritual bond with Azell Abernathy, a soft-spoken, church-going carpenter. As their connection deepens, and Abasiama’s house–and soul–become clearer, she comes to understand the true nature of love. In Old Age comes to ArtsEmerson in partnership with Front Porch Arts Collective as part of a two-year, citywide production of Udofia’s epic in Boston.
Location: Paramount Center – JLBB, 559 Washington Street, Boston
The Outsiders
Audio described: Saturday, April 4, 2026, 2:00 PM
The Outsidersis the winner of the 2024 Tony Award® for Best Musical and is adapted from S.E. HINTON’s seminal novel and FRANCIS FORD COPPOLA’s iconic film. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1967, Ponyboy Curtis, his best friend Johnny Cade and their Greaser family of “outsiders” battle with their affluent rivals, the Socs. The Outsiders navigates the complexities of self-discovery as the Greasers dream about who they want to become in a world that may never accept them. With a dynamic original score, The Outsiders is a story of friendship, family, and the realization that there is still “lots of good in the world.”
Location: Citizens Opera House, 539 Washington Street, Boston
Charlotte’s Web
Audio described: Sunday, April 12, 2026, 2:00 PM, Thursday, April 16, 2026, 10:30 AM (Student Matinee), & Saturday, April 18, 2026, 2:00 PM
Adapted from the beloved novel by E.B. White, Charlotte’s Web tells the heartwarming story of friendship, loyalty, and the cycle of life on a family farm. When Fern Arable saves the runt of the litter, a pig named Wilbur, he begins a new life in the barnyard, where he meets a host of colorful animals. Despite his friendly nature, Wilbur soon learns that his future is grim—until he befriends Charlotte, a wise and kind-hearted spider. Determined to save Wilbur from the butcher, Charlotte spins miraculous messages in her web that proclaim his greatness, capturing the attention of the humans and turning Wilbur into a local celebrity. As seasons change, the animals experience joy, fear, and loss, ultimately celebrating the enduring power of love and selflessness.
Location: Wheelock Family Theatre, Boston University, 180 The Riverway, Boston, MA
Beauty and the Beast
Audio described: Sunday, April 19, 2026, 1:00 PM,
& Saturday, May 2, 2026 2:00 PM
Be Our Guest at Disney’s 30th Anniversary production of Beauty and the Beast, the breathtaking musical filled with the romance and grandeur audiences know and love. This enchanting and timeless tale has been brought to life like never before, with spectacular new sets and dazzling costumes. The show boasts the Oscar®-winning and Tony Award®-nominated score, including the classic songs “Be Our Guest” and “Beauty and the Beast.” Beauty and the Beast is the beloved musical that will fill your heart with joy and Disney magic.
Location: Citizens Opera House, 539 Washington Street, Boston
The Secret Sharer
Audio described: Sunday, May 3, 2026, 2:00 PM
The Secret Sharer is a powerful multimedia performance blending dance, music, sound, text, and art installation. Often considered an early Queer text, The Secret Sharer tells the story of two men—a ship’s Captain and a stowaway accused of murder—and the bond the two develop as the stowaway is secretly sheltered in the Captain’s quarters. Audience members create the ship’s perimeter and are invited to share their own stories, inviting a collaborative space where audiences co-create the environment. In the face of violence and discrimination, the characters reveal the healing which often arises in the presence of vulnerability, intimacy, and resilience.
Location: TBD
Swept Away
Audio described: Tentative dates: Saturday, May 16, 2026, 2:00 PM, & Friday, May 22, 2026, 7:30 PM
A musical by the Avett Brothers, book by John Logan. A storm. A shipwreck. Four survivors. As they fight to stay alive, these New Bedford whalers must confront who they are, what they’ve done, and whether forgiveness is possible. Featuring music from The Avett Brothers, Swept Away is a gripping, heart-rending new musical about brotherhood, morality, and the cost of survival.
Location: Speakeasy Stage, Calderwood Pavilion, Boston Center for the Arts, 527 Tremont St., Boston MA
The Music Man
Audio described: Sunday, May 17, 2026, 1:00 PM
There’s trouble in River City when a fast-talking salesman gets his heart stolen by the town librarian. Meredith Willson’s six-time, Tony® Award winning musical comedy The Music Man follows traveling salesman, Harold Hill, as he cons the people of River City, Iowa, into buying instruments and uniforms for a boys’ band that he vows to organize – despite the fact that he doesn’t know a trombone from a treble clef. His plans to skip town with the cash are foiled when he falls for Marian, the librarian, who transforms him into a respectable citizen. Featuring songs such as “Seventy-Six Trombones,” “Trouble,” “‘Til There Was You,” and “Gary, Indiana,” The Music Man is a family-friendly story to be shared with every generation.
Location: Hanover Theater, 2 Southbridge Street, Worcester, MA
Oedipus El Rey
Audio described: Saturday, June 6, 2026, 2:00 PM
Luis Alfaro reimagines Sophocles’ classic in his acclaimed and electrifying Oedipus El Rey, set in the heart of Los Angeles. Oedipus dreams of rewriting his own story — but liberation comes at a price: can he truly escape the destiny laid out before him? What’s fate, and what’s just the system? A searing tale of love, family, and prophecy, Oedipus El Rey blends ancient myth with modern urgency and Chicano swagger with swaths of sly humor. Artistic Director Loretta Greco creates a production especially for Boston.
Location: The Huntington Calderwood Pavilion, 527 Tremont Street, Boston
Firebird Part 2
Audio described: Friday-Sunday, June 19 – 21, 2026, times TBD
This is an original ballet created as a second part to the original Firebird ADB created in 2021. The Firebird is questioning her role in society and through that creating a ripple effect that transforms the roles society places us in and breaking through to our own truth. For tickets for performances, Register at ticketstripe.com/adbmusic
Location: Boston University Joan & Edgar Booth Theatre, 808 Commonwealth Avenue, Brookline
Les Misérables
Audio described: Sunday, June 14, 2026, 1:00 PM, & Saturday, June 27, 2026, 2:00 PM
Cameron Mackintosh presents the acclaimed production of Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg’s Tony Award®-winning musical phenomenon, Les Misérables. Set against the backdrop of 19th century France, Les Misérables tells an enthralling story of broken dreams and unrequited love, passion, sacrifice and redemption–a timeless testament to the survival of the human spirit. The magnificent score of Les Misérables includes the songs “I Dreamed a Dream,” “On My Own,” “Bring Him Home,” “One Day More,” “Master of the House” and many more. Les Misérables is undisputedly one of the world’s most popular musicals.
Location: Citizens Opera House, 539 Washington Street, Boston
Black Swan
Audio described: Saturday, June 27, 2026, 2:00 PM and Saturday, July 11, 2026, 2:00 PM
A new musical adaptation of the 2010 Academy Award-nominated psychological thriller Black Swan to life on stage. As driven ballerina Nina fights for the lead role in Swan Lake, pressure increases and boundaries blur, and she begins to unravel. This haunting exploration of ambition, rivalry, and the cost of perfection.
Location: Loeb Drama Center, 64 Brattle Street, Cambridge
The Great Gatsby
Audio described: Sunday, July 12, 2026, 1:00 PM
Based on the classic American novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the Tony Award®-winning new musical is an unforgettable journey of love, wealth and tragedy that brings the Roaring Twenties to life on stage.
Location: Citizens Opera House, 539 Washington Street, Boston
Moulin Rouge! The Musical
Audio described: Sunday, August 2, 2026, 1:00 PM
Moulin Rouge! is the winner of 10 Tony Awards® — including Best Musical! Enter a world of splendor and romance, of eye-popping excess, of glitz, grandeur, and glory! A world where Bohemians and aristocrats rub elbows and revel in electrifying enchantment. It is a celebration of Truth, Beauty, Freedom, and — above all — Love.aa
Location: Citizens Opera House, 539 Washington Street, Boston