Theatre Three in Port Jefferson: History and Season Guide

Theatre Three was founded in 1969, and its home at 412 Main Street is a converted nineteenth-century hall that has served as a meeting place, a school gymnasium, a vaudeville house and a movie theater. The company calls itself a year-round, not-for-profit professional regional theatre, and its 2026-27 schedule, posted on its website, runs from a fall musical through a winter play and into a full children’s series.

How the company began

The theatre’s About Us page gives 1969 as its founding year. A 2018 profile in TBR News Media names the founders as Jerry Friedman, John Herr and Linda Herr, and reports that the company first performed at Smith Haven Ministries at the Smith Haven Mall. The name has a local explanation. Board member and former artistic director Bradlee Bing said, “They all lived in the Three Village area, hence the name, ‘Theatre Three.'”

The company later used several spaces, including the First Presbyterian Church on Main Street in the village. According to the same article, it bought its present building at 412 Main Street in 1979, after the United Artists theater there closed. Jeffrey Sanzel is the Executive Artistic Director listed on the company’s site, alongside Vivian Koutrakos as Managing Director.

The building

The company’s website describes its home as Athena Hall, a late nineteenth-century historic building it has used for more than fifty years. Wikipedia’s article on Theatre Three supplies more of the building’s story: it was built as a common meeting place for the village of Port Jefferson, served as the high school gymnasium after a fire, became a vaudeville house and then a movie theater, and later fell into disuse. At some point the space was cut in half to create an upstairs theater with raked seating and lobbies, with a second stage below. The same article reports that Griswold film splicers were manufactured in the building’s shop, which is now the second stage, and gives the main theater a capacity of 408.

The Wikipedia text is a secondary source and counts the company’s tenure in seasons, so the exact timeline of the conversions is better confirmed with the theatre.

Cinema Treasures, a user-edited database of theaters, lists the structure under several names over time: Athena Hall, the Port Jefferson Theatre, the Art Theatre and, from the late 1970s, Theatre Three. It gives two possible construction dates, 1863 and 1874, and does not settle between them, which fits the cautionary note above. The same entry records storm damage on September 25, 2018, estimated at $50,000, with the company aiming to reopen within days. Because the entry is user-edited, the dates and names are best treated as leads for further research instead of settled fact.

How a season is organized

The About Us page says the Mainstage season typically includes six productions: three musicals, two plays and A Christmas Carol. The theatre’s home page lists the 2026-27 season in three groups.

• Mainstage: Cabaret from September 19 to October 25, 2026; A Christmas Carol from November 7 to December 27, 2026; and Biloxi Blues from January 16 to February 7, 2027.
• Special events: The Parlor of Mystery, listed from October 22, 2026, to June 3, 2027; An Evening with Bob Nelson and Friends, listed from October 25, 2026, to June 6, 2027; and The New York Bee Gees on November 19, 2026, for one night only.
• Children’s Theatre: Elephant & Piggie’s We’re in a Play! from September 25 to October 24, 2026; Barnaby Saves Christmas from November 21 to December 27, 2026; and Total Eclipse: The Princess Squad from January 22 to February 20, 2027.

The home page showed only part of the season when it was read in mid-October 2026, so additional titles may appear later.

Programs beyond the Mainstage

The company’s activities extend well past the main season. Its Festival of One-Act Plays has produced more than one hundred world premieres, according to its About Us page, and Friday Night Face-Off is described as Long Island’s longest-running improv troupe. The Dramatic Academy offers classes for ages 6 to 17, the in-house Children’s Theatre creates original musicals, and educational touring programs have reached schools and community centers across the tri-state area. A summer concert series is also listed. The same page notes public funding from Suffolk County and the New York State Council on the Arts.

The children’s side of the company is a sizable part of the calendar: three children’s productions are on the 2026-27 list above. Wikipedia’s Theatre Three entry describes the in-house Children’s Theatre as producing original topical musicals and also running touring programs on subjects that include bullying, a reminder that the theatre’s work reaches beyond the Main Street building.

Wikipedia lists long-ago Long Island premieres produced there, among them Into the Woods, Children of a Lesser God and M. Butterfly.

Collaboration with local history groups also appears. The Three Village Historical Society’s Culper Spy Day page lists a free play, Treason’s Trial, at Theatre Three on October 3, 2026, with performances at 2:30 and 4:30 p.m.

The holiday tradition and the one-act festival

A Christmas Carol is the best-known fixture on the calendar and returns on the 2026-27 schedule. Wikipedia’s article on Jeffrey Sanzel reports that he joined the company in 1989 as Children’s Theatre Coordinator, co-adapted and directed the Mainstage production that year, became Artistic Director in 1993, and has played Scrooge every holiday season since 1990. The same entry says he re-adapts and directs the show each year. Some counts on that page, such as the number of times he has played the role, are uncited there and are not repeated here.

The Festival of One-Act Plays is the other signature program. A review in TBR News Media covers the 24th annual edition in 2023, which presented new one-act plays chosen from 750 submissions from around the world and ran about an hour and a half with a brief intermission. It was staged on the second stage, which the article calls the second stage at The Ronald F. Peierls Theatre, with tickets at $20 and a cash bar on arrival. Prices and formats from that year are not a guide to the current season, but they show the scale of the festival.

Attending a show

The home page gives a box office schedule of Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and on Sundays beginning two hours before showtime. The box office telephone number is 631-928-9100, group sales are at 631-928-1130, and the business office is at 631-928-9202.

The page describes two kinds of subscriptions. A dated subscription reserves the subscriber’s own seats on the same day for each show. A coupon subscription provides one seat each for five or six shows, with more flexible scheduling. A ticket policy page is linked from the site, but it could not be loaded when this article was prepared, so exchange, refund and age guidance should be read there.

Parking and accessibility details were not found on the pages read, which means a call to the box office is the more reliable way to confirm arrangements for a specific performance, including seating and mobility needs. Port Jefferson’s downtown is covered by an earlier piece on the walkable village, which can help with planning a dinner or stroll before curtain.

Nearby

Readers curious about the harbor’s industrial past can find background in the article on Port Jefferson’s shipbuilding history. The Drowned Meadow Cottage Museum in Port Jefferson also takes part in the historical society’s Culper Spy Day, according to the TVHS page cited above.

Related reading

The wider North Shore arts calendar is addressed in the 2026 summer events guide.

This article is general information about a local cultural organization and is not a recommendation of any production.

Hours, programs and prices change; confirm details with the official sources linked above before visiting.

Sources

• Theatre Three (official site)
• Theatre Three: About Us
• Wikipedia: Theatre Three
• TBR News Media: Theatre Three 50th anniversary profile (2018)
• Wikipedia: Jeffrey Sanzel
• TBR News Media: Theatre Three Festival of One-Act Plays (2023)
• Cinema Treasures: Theatre Three
• Three Village Historical Society: Culper Spy Day