Founded in 1945, it is a higher art college for cultivating drama professionals, a comprehensive performing arts college with a complete range of arts in China, and a center of the Asia-Pacific Bureau of the International Theatre Association of UNESCO

Shanghai Theatre Academy is a professional art academy that focuses on cultivating dramatic art talents. Since its establishment in 1945, the school has always adhered to the concept of elite education, formed a distinctive talent training model of professional art colleges, and cultivated a large number of cultural and artistic talents for China.

The predecessor of the school was the Shanghai Municipal Experimental Drama School, which was founded on December 1, 1945 by the famous dramatists Li Jianwu, Gu Zhongyi and Huang Zuolin with the support of the famous educator Gu Yuxiu. In October 1949, Shanghai Experimental Drama School was renamed Shanghai Municipal Drama College. In 1952, colleges and universities across the country implemented the adjustment of faculties, and the Drama Department of the Art Department of Shandong University and the Drama Group of Shanghai Xingzhi Art School were merged and officially established and renamed the East China Branch of the Central Academy of Drama. In 1956, it was officially named Shanghai Theater Academy, which was a higher professional art school directly under the Ministry of Culture, with Xiong Foxi as the first president. In April 2000, it was transferred to the Shanghai Municipal Government and the Ministry of Culture, and in June 2002, the former School of Performing Arts of Shanghai Normal University was merged, and Shanghai Opera School and Shanghai Dance School became affiliated schools of the school.

The university has 2,596 full-time students, including 1,801 undergraduates, 2 postdoctoral mobile stations, 2 first-level disciplines authorized for doctoral degrees, and 4 first-level disciplines authorized for master's degrees. At present, there are 11 secondary teaching units, including the Department of Acting, the Department of Directing, the Department of Drama and Literature, the Department of Stage Design, the School of Film and Television, the School of Drama, the School of Dance, the School of Creativity, the Musical Theatre Performing Arts Center, the Department of Public Instruction, and the Graduate School, as well as two secondary schools, the Affiliated Opera School and the Affiliated Dance School.

The school has 20 undergraduate majors, and according to the characteristics of art colleges and universities to cultivate specialized art talents, there are also a number of professional directions under each major. At present, there are 15 majors in the undergraduate program, namely acting, drama, film and television directing, drama, film and television literature, art education, drama, film and television art design, painting, public affairs management, visual communication design, digital media art, radio and television choreography, film and television photography and production, broadcasting and hosting arts, dance performance, dance choreography, composition and composition technology theory. Among them, there are 3 national-level characteristic majors and 1 Shanghai characteristic major.  

The school has four campuses: Huashan Road Campus is the location of the Department of Acting, the Department of Directing, the Department of Drama and Literature, the Department of Stage Design, the Musical Theatre Performing Arts Center and the School of Creativity, and the future function is positioned as a theater art education center. The Lianhua Road Campus is the location of the School of Chinese Opera, the School of Film and Television, and the affiliated School of Chinese Opera, and is positioned as a center for Chinese opera education in the future. Located at the Shanghai International Dance Center, Hongqiao Road Campus was officially opened in March 2017, with the existing dance academy and affiliated dance school, and the future function is positioned as a dance education center. The Pujiang Campus started construction on December 1, 2016 and is expected to open in the new semester of 2019.

As of September 2016, the school has 270 full-time teachers, of which 36.67% have senior professional titles. There were 168 teachers with master's degrees, accounting for 62.2%, and 47 teachers with doctoral degrees, accounting for 17.4%. 74.8% of teachers are under the age of 45. Each major has basically formed a teaching team with a relatively reasonable structure and a relatively rich level. In recent years, the school has improved the level of the teaching staff to a certain extent through the implementation of the undergraduate teaching teacher incentive plan and the peak plateau discipline construction plan.

Since its establishment, the school's teachers have made remarkable achievements, and the school is not only an educational unit, but also a cultural center in Shanghai and even the whole country. In the sixties of the twentieth century, the school's performance of "The Young Generation" influenced an entire generation. In the past three years, the school has received a number of projects funded by the National Arts Fund, and a series of original plays have produced good social repercussions, such as the original drama "Children of the Country", "The Four Ministers of the Ming Dynasty" and the dance drama "Red". In order to promote teaching, the school's professional teachers also actively participate in various artistic creations in the society, and have won a number of national awards in the fields of playwriting, table directing and stage design.

At present, the school has four first-level disciplines: drama and film and television, art theory, design, music and dance, and drama and film and television have been selected into the first class of discipline construction plan of the Shanghai Municipal Education Commission, and design and art theory have been selected into the second and third class construction plans of plateau disciplines respectively. During the "Twelfth Five-Year Plan" period, the university has won a number of national scientific research projects, such as the National Social Science Foundation Project, the National Social Science Foundation Art Project, the Humanities and Social Science Research Project of the Ministry of Education, the National Cultural Science and Technology Promotion Project of the Ministry of Culture, and the National Cultural Innovation Project of the Ministry of Culture, and the number of scientific research projects has exceeded year after year.

The school has established a cooperation mechanism with various important art troupes and institutions in China, and has jointly built a school-level student practice base with the China National Theatre, the National Centre for the Performing Arts, the Beijing People's Art Theatre, the Shanghai Dramatic Art Center, the Shanghai Song and Dance Troupe, and the Shanghai Yue Opera Theater. In addition, the school carries out a wide range of artistic creation practice activities for undergraduate students through student art practice projects such as the College Student Innovation and Entrepreneurship Project, the Shell Program and the "Huichuang Youth" program, and creates more than 100 works of art every year.

Over the past 70 years, the school has cultivated nearly 10,000 art professionals for the country, and a considerable number of them have become famous artists with influence in the fields of drama, film and television, dance and art in Shanghai, China and even the world.