Big Umbrella Festival

Mark your calendars! April 4–20, 2025

Annually each spring, Big Umbrella Festival welcomes kids, teens, and young adults for a dynamic series of programming, designed with and for neurodiverse audiences. The 2025 festival will span three weeks in April, offering distinct events and activations each weekend. When the World Turns by Polyglot Theatre and Oily Cart, an immersive theatrical experience that celebrates the senses, invites audiences into a wondrous landscape of foliage, light, sounds, and shadows. Peruvian theater company Teatro La Plaza reinvents Shakespeare’s Hamlet into a joyful and enigmatic production where the stories of people with Down syndrome take center stage. Young children and families are invited to explore, move, and become a part of the performance with SecondHand Dance’s The Sticky Dance and at the interactive Los Trompos "spinning tops" installation outdoors at Damrosch Park. The renowned ReelAbilities Film Festival—the largest festival in the world dedicated to films by and about people with disabilities—returns; and the Chamber Music Society offers two relaxed musical performances, created for children with autism and sensory disorders. More details and the full schedule for these multi-sensory, participatory, and engaging artistic experiences will be announced soon!

 

Thanks to Our Supporters

Lead support for educational programming is provided by Anonymous

Support for the Big Umbrella Festival is provided by The Taft Foundation, Esme Usdan and James Snyder, New York City Council Member Gale Brewer, and by public funds facilitated by New York City Council’s Autism Awareness Initiative