Quantum Theatre Founder Karla Boos Will Retire Next Year

PHOTO COURTESY QUANTUM THEATRE

For more than 35 years, Karla Boos has led the bold, nomadic Quantum Theatre to surprising venues around the city. A year from now, the company she turned into a nationally recognized powerhouse will continue its journey without her.

Boos, the founder and artistic director of Quantum, will retire at the end of 2026. The company announced Monday that a search for Boos’ successor, supported by The DeVos Institute of Arts and Nonprofit Management, will begin in January, with a new artistic director scheduled to be in place by summer 2026.

“There’s been a lot of preparation for the search; I’ve been involved in that,” Boos says, “because the search committee wants things about the character of the company to continue … I can sell Quantum, I think, to the candidates — because it’s been so great for me.”

Boos founded the company in 1990, coming to Pittsburgh from Los Angeles, where she performed in experimental productions and earned a Master’s degree at the California Institute of the Arts. Since its inception, the company has produced 106 shows; Boos has produced all of them. She has also directed an impressive 33 — and wrote or adapted nine more, in addition to numerous acting appearances.

“I am satisfied with my work — or I wouldn’t be stepping away. I know that my creative life will continue, but I feel it may change and morph,” Boos says.

She’ll remain with the company long enough to direct William Shakespeare’s “The Tempest,” set to be performed this summer at the Carrie Blast Furnaces National Historic Landmark. It’s a return to the site for Quantum after rapturously received productions of “King Lear” and “Hamlet” at the site — and Boos says the choice of show is deliberate for her farewell effort.

“I join a long line of people who’ve chosen to do ‘The Tempest’ [as a swan song] because of the beautiful and complex things it has said about people who have tried to control something — who have built a world and tried to control it, for good or for ill.” Boos is particularly excited to further explore the Carrie Furnaces site, saying the show will take place at “a completely different part of the campus that is nature-focused. We’re sure that we’re going to surprise people.”

She’ll also program the company’s 2026/27 season, which will begin with “The Tempest.” (Quantum has one more show in its current season: the backstage comedy “10 Out of 12,” set for April at the Mellon Institute.)

Amid an uncertain moment for arts organizations, Boos has nothing but confidence in the future for the company she created.

“It’s such a beautiful team for a new person to be supported by. Not only Julie [DeSeyn, Quantum’s executive director], but Alex Ungerman, who’s director of production … Julie has built a fantastic team; that’s why the company is so solid.”