Welcome to Marathon Community Theatre

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Marathon Community Theatre (MCT) is located in Marathon, Florida - the heart of the Florida Keys - at 5101 Overseas Hwy (Mile Marker 49.5 Ocean Side).  We are the ONLY Community Theatre located in Monroe County and house the ONLY Theatre and Cinema within a 50 mile radius. 

Marathon Community Theatre is a 501(c)(3) not for profit organization that is operated by a fully volunteer Board of Directors with a small paid staff.

Beginning in 1944 as a traveling troupe called the Marathon Little Theatre, our organization held its early productions at restaurants, hotels, City Hall and even the local High School.  For just over 50-years, tents and travel trailers assembled in parking lots acted as the Backstage where actors donned their costumes and got into their make-up.  By the early nineties the MCT Board of Directors, our General Membership and the local community came together to raise the funds needed to purchase our current venue - which has been Marathon's primary entertainment center - originally housing the Plaza Lounge, The Side Door Lounge and the Middle Keys only movie theatre - The Marathon Cinema. 

Marathon Community Theatre volunteers set to work renovating the building, creating the treasured theatre you find today, opening the 1996 theatrical season with Man of La Mancha.  Over the past 80-years Marathon Community Theatre has striven to create a true Cultural Arts Center, revamping the movie theatre to provide up-to-date digital films and sound (2013), paying off the original building mortgage (2016), completing major repairs sustained from Hurricane Irma (2017), installing a new digital lighting system in the theatre's main auditorium (2019) and the replacement of three commercial HVAC systems in 2020.  Recently the Marathon Community Theatre retained management and staffing of the newly named Marathon Community Cinema after over twelve years of leasing to outside tenants.  The Marathon Community Cinema reopened to the public in mid February 2021, after the cinema’s 11-month closure due to the 2020 Pandemic.

The Marathon Community Theatre offers four major main-stage productions per season (which runs July through June), fine art exhibitions in our gallery, weekly dance classes for current theatre members, annual holiday events, fundraisers and variety shows, gallery and main-stage readings, guest performances and concerts, an annual community dance showcase and a six week Summer Theatre Camp for children ages 6 to 18 years old.  

The Marathon Community Theater cast members, crew members and volunteers are unique to our area - an odd collection of boaters, postal workers, lawyers, office and retail workers, construction laborers and even a few local dolphin trainers.  Membership ranges from tweens to grandmas, pigtails to balding patterns, high tops to bunions.  It’s not uncommon to see an 80-year-old tap dancing across the MCT stage or a local child with unknown talent wowing the audience.  All of the members on-stage and behind-the-scenes are volunteers, with an eclectic blend of loveable misfits bringing their outstanding talent to you in our little corner of paradise – The Fabulous Florida Keys!

The Marathon Community Theatre offers multiple events throughout the entire year, including four main-stage theatrical productions, intimate gallery readings, public art shows, concerts, community dance showcases, annual variety show fundraiser, children's summer theatre program and multiple special events.  

The Marathon Community Theatre has multiple spaces available for rent. In the past we have hosted dance classes, music concerts, theatrical events, business and organization meetings and private parties - even hosting a few weddings right on our main-stage!  If you are interested in renting a space at Marathon Community Theatre or Marathon Community Cinema, please contact our General Manager at gm@marathontheater.org for our pricing and rental information. 

Our aim is to produce engaging, inspiring, high quality theatrical productions that entertain our diverse community of local citizens, seasonal residents and large tourist population; train and support the next generation of theatre artists; provide arts education programs that promote life-long learning to our local community; and celebrate the essential power of the arts to illuminate our common humanity.

• JOANNE ZIMMERMAN - President
• MARESA CASEY - Executive Vice President
• JUDI GORMAN - Vice President of Production
• DION WATSON - Treasurer
• SHARON YOUNG - Secretary
• ABBI COLELLA
• LINDA DIAZ
• JOHN HUNT
• SKIP LEFLER 
• JERRY NUSSENBLATT 
• CHRIS STILL