Yale Ventures has named Tony® and Grammy® Award-winning creative producer Mara Isaacs as the 2026–27 Artist-in-Residence for the Cultural Innovation Lab at Yale (CILY). Isaacs, founder of Octopus Theatricals and a current Entrepreneur-in-Residence with Yale Ventures, has spent her career developing ambitious creative work and building the organizations, relationships and pathways that allow it to reach the world.

CILY’s Artist-in-Residence program is built around a simple premise: 

CILY’s Artist-in-Residence program is built around a simple premise: “An Artist-in-Residence is, at its most fundamental, an invitation: an institution extending itself toward a practitioner whose work and worldview it believes can change the nature of the place.” The residency is a sustained, reciprocal commitment in which the artist brings their practice into the life of the institution, and the institution adapts to what that practice demands.

“Last year, I asked the artists working with CILY what they needed from us,” said Frances Pollock, Director of the Cultural Innovation Lab. “One thing they said has stayed with me: before they could imagine themselves as leaders in other industries, they needed to see themselves as leaders in their own. If we want artists to think bigger about what they can build, own, lead and change, we have to put them in relationship with people who make that kind of ambition feel real. Mara does that.”

“She has built at an extraordinary scale in our field, and she is still interrogating the field itself,” Pollock continued. “She is still experimenting. Still producing. Still asking whether the systems we inherited are actually the systems we want to keep. She understands leverage. She understands relationships. She understands how much trouble the cultural sector is in right now, and she is still willing to build anyway. She is funny, courageous and deeply curious. I want our artists around that energy. I want them to embody it.”

As Artist-in-Residence, Isaacs will work directly with artists, students, entrepreneurs and cultural organizations across Yale and Connecticut. She will mentor ventures participating in the Lab’s programs, contribute to public programming, and bring her producing practice into an ecosystem that connects artists with investors, entrepreneurs, researchers, lawyers and institutions.

 “The work of the Cultural Innovation Lab is groundbreaking.  In this historic moment where most people only see scarcity, Frances Pollack and the CILY community see possibility. It's a profound opportunity to forge new pathways for generating meaningful work across sectors. I can’t wait to dig in and see what we can catalyze together.” - Mara Isaacs

The exchange is intentionally reciprocal.

“We are building a pretty wild ecosystem across Yale and the state of Connecticut right now,” Pollock said. “Artists, investors, producers, institutions, researchers, entrepreneurs and lawyers are starting to bump into one another in ways they normally would not. I am equally excited about what CILY can do for Mara. I cannot wait to start plugging her into that ecosystem and see what happens.”
 

Audiences and New Paths to Production

Isaacs will kick off the public portion of her residency on Monday, October 5 from 7:00–9:00 p.m. EDT with Collective CT: Audiences and New Paths to Production — A Fireside Chat with Yale Ventures Artist-in-Residence Mara Isaacs. The virtual event is open to the public.

The conversation will explore a question at the center of both Isaacs’ practice and the Cultural Innovation Lab’s work: what does it take for an extraordinary creative idea to become something bigger—a production, a company, a community or a movement?
Drawing on Isaacs’ experience across Broadway, independent theater, international touring, opera, experimental performance and new media, the discussion will examine how producers recognize possibility before everyone else can see it; how a project finds its first audience; how collaborators, champions and partners become part of an emerging idea; and how artists and producers can build structures around their work that allow it to grow.

The fireside chat comes as CILY begins its second year of work around cultural entrepreneurship, ownership, capital, audience and long-term sustainability. The Lab was created to bring the infrastructure and rigor traditionally associated with university innovation and technology transfer into cultural production, giving artists and cultural makers greater ability to participate in and benefit from the value their work creates.
 

Register here >

A Beat of Our Own

Isaacs begins her residency while actively producing new work. This October, McCarter Theatre Center in Princeton, New Jersey will present A Beat of Our Own, a new musical comedy produced by special arrangement with Mara Isaacs, Tom Kirdahy and Peggy Koenig.

From the Tony Award-winning producers of Hadestown, A Beat of Our Own enters the world of competitive bhangra dance through teammates Mary and Preeti, whose championship-winning partnership fractures over Mary’s desire to fuse multiple Indian dance styles into their routine. Mary responds by forming a new team of inexperienced dancers and, with help from a former Bollywood star, begins the improbable task of turning them into contenders.

The musical features a book by Rehana Lew Mirza and Mike Lew, music and lyrics by Sam Willmott, choreography by Rujuta Vaidya, musical staging by Tony Award nominee Jesse Robb, and direction by Olivier Award nominee Stafford Arima. The production brings together questions of creative ambition, competition, tradition, experimentation and community—the same kinds of questions that run through much of Isaacs’ broader producing practice.

A Beat of Our Own runs October 7–25, 2026 at McCarter Theatre Center, 91 University Place in Princeton. The first performance is Wednesday, October 7 at 7:30 p.m., with evening and matinee performances continuing throughout the run.

Buy tickets here >