Our Founding Executive Producer
An accomplished leader, Mitch Nugent infuses the organization and its creations with beauty and vitality.
“Beauty has this way of waking us up. On stage, in life—it invites us in, stirs something deep, reminds us of what’s possible.
And when we share it—when we experience it together—that’s when life sings. That’s when wonder and awe take center stage, and we remember why any of it matters.”
—Mitch Nugent
Mitch Nugent believes shared live experiences can wake us up — to beauty, possibility, one another, and what it means to feel fully alive. At their best, the arts are oxygen for the soul.
That belief has guided more than three decades of his work as a performing arts leader.
In 2010, Mitch co-founded Prima Theatre around a simple conviction: invigorating lives through fresh theatrical experiences.
Since then, he has built Prima from the ground up into a seven-figure nonprofit arts organization — championing dozens of new works and world-premiere theatrical experiences, raising substantial resources for professional performing arts in the region, growing audiences while broader industry trends have declined, and cultivating an audience more than 20 years younger than the national average. Along the way, he has forged partnerships across Lancaster’s business, philanthropic, educational, civic, and arts communities.
At the heart of Mitch’s work are curiosity, hope, and imagination. He loves bringing artists and business leaders, donors and dreamers, national talent and local collaborators around the same table and asking: What might become possible together?
That instinct has helped shape Prima into what Stroll Magazine has called “Pennsylvania’s premier boutique theater,” while increasingly connecting Lancaster with artists and producers working at the highest levels of the field.
Mitch has developed original theatrical partnerships with TIME 100 honoree and bestselling author Rob Bell and #1 New York Times bestselling author Kate Baer. Prima has also welcomed guest artists including Stephen Schwartz, Billy Porter, Shoshana Bean, Jason Robert Brown, Alice Ripley, and Adam Pascal. Mitch is also collaborating with Broadway artists and Tony Award-winning producer Cody Lassen to help move promising new work from first idea toward regional, New York, and commercial life.
Beyond Prima, Mitch has brought that same belief in possibility and human vitality to public speaking and consulting work with organizations including Adobe, Pfizer, Willow Valley Communities, and Penn Medicine.
Under his leadership, Prima earned support from the National Endowment for the Arts, supporting the development and world premiere of original work. Mitch’s leadership has also been recognized with a Gubernatorial Commendation for Arts Service to Pennsylvania, honors for Innovation in Programming and Nonprofit Leadership Excellence, the Steinman Foundation Pursuit of Equity Award, the Jefferson Awards Foundation One in a Million Award for Public Service, and recognition among Central Penn Business Journal’s 300 most influential leaders in the region.
And as Prima has grown, so has the question Mitch is asking:
What if Lancaster became a place where extraordinary creative experiences don’t simply arrive — they begin?
He is now leading Prima toward deepened roots in Lancaster, wider national reach, a growing pipeline of Lancaster-born new work, and ultimately a purpose-designed cultural campus where artists, audiences, and fresh ideas have room to come fully alive.
Mitch lives in Lancaster City with his wife, Diana — Prima’s co-founder and Resident Costume Director — and their two sons, Aiden and Sutter.
The future is expansive.
But the heart remains the same: invigorating lives through fresh theatrical experiences.
“In the heart of Lancaster, a cultural renaissance is underway, thanks to the visionary leadership of Mitch Nugent.”” — NPR
“In the heart of Lancaster, a cultural renaissance is underway, thanks to the visionary leadership of Mitch Nugent.”” — NPR
“THEATRE IMPRESSARIO” — Susquehanna Style
“THEATRE IMPRESSARIO” — Susquehanna Style
“CHANGEMAKER” — Fig Magazine
“CHANGEMAKER” — Fig Magazine
