New Art Theatre continues a 22 year tradition of producing the world's greatest plays. Artistic Director Robert Shea produced period and contemporary classics as part of The Living Classics Series at the Palace Theatre in the early 1980's. The celebrated Living Classics Series (produced in partnership with the New Hampshire Performing Arts Center), produced over 60 plays serving New England's student and public audiences alike from 1983-1995. A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Tempest, Othello, Hamlet and Henry IV part i, are memorable Elizabethan productions from this period. Desire Under the Elms, The Crucible, Our Town, The Glass Menagerie, Death of a Salesman, M. Butterfly, and The Homecoming by Harold Pinter, are examples of the company's 20th Century repertoire. During this initial 12 year period, the Living Classics Series developed an extensive network of audiences and became a pillar of northern New England's cultural lifestyle.

In 1996, The Living Classics Series re-organized as New Art Theatre and has been presented at the Dana Center/ Saint Anselm College, The Palace Theatre, the New Hampshire Institute of Art, The Barnstormers Theatre, and The Franklin Opera House. This new generation of Theatre Classics include: The Miser by Moliere, Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett, Oedipus Rex by Sophocles, and Macbeth by Shakespeare. New Art Theatre's "New Works Series" includes: The Bone Ring by Donald Hall, How I Learned to Drive by Paula Vogel, and Language Roulette by Belfast, Northern Ireland playwright, Daragh Carville.