“Through public art, like the project we are here to celebrate today, exceptional entertainment and events, you are ushering us into the next 100 years,” says Sen. Bobby Joe Champion about the Trust and stakeholders who help make these projects possible. “Here is to the people of Hennepin Avenue and next 100 years of the Hennepin Theatre District!”

Most of the performers in the musical revue When You Wish Upon a Star have a hard time picking one favorite song. That’s not the case for Grace Renstrom, a high school senior in Hennepin Theatre Trust’s Spotlight Education program. She says “Singin’ in the Rain” is special.

Audience members and artists share the impact of zAmya Theater Project’s new show. A collaboration with Hennepin Theatre Trust and The Salvation Army’s Harbor Light Center, the play Stories From the Book of Harbor Light premiered at 900 Hennepin, sparking conversation about homelessness.

“Get low! Get low!” The booming direction from the mouth of Harriet Tubman commanded a room full of people on a trip through a dark period of U.S. history. Those words — at one point in time — might have saved the lives of the people in Tubman’s care. This night, those words served as a call to action — to share in that history and its lessons.

zAmya Theater works with residents at The Salvation Army’s Harbor Center to create a new show about homelessness to premiere at Hennepin Theatre Trust’s 900 Hennepin.

For students from more than 30 high schools in Minnesota and beyond, the best part about spending a day at the historic Orpheum Theatre to see HAMILTON was actually performing on the stage where it happens themselves. Through rap, monologue and even folk guitar, students participating in a program known as EduHam seized opportunities to do what HAMILTON actors do: tell stories about history through musical theatre.

Hennepin Theatre Trust launched 5 to 10 on Hennepin three years ago, recognizing the need to activate the neighborhood to address concerns about crime rates in the downtown arts district. As the largest landowner along the downtown stretch of Hennepin, including the historic Orpheum, State and Pantages Theatres, Hennepin Theatre Trust feels a responsibility to build and strengthen the community.

How do you turn a five-story brick wall into a jaw-dropping work of art? Simple. You invite a world-famous graffiti artist to cover it with a kaleidoscopic mural of Minnesota-grown international folk icon Bob Dylan.