The American Repertory Theater, one of the nation’s leading regional theaters, is planning to move from Cambridge, Mass., to Boston, Harvard University said Thursday.

The university, which houses the theater, said it had received $100 million from the hedge fund manager David E. Goel, who is a Harvard alumnus, and his wife, Stacey L. Goel, to begin fund-raising and planning for what it is calling a “research and performance center” in Allston, a section of Boston just across the Charles River from Harvard Square. The center will include a new home for the A.R.T.

Allston is already home to Harvard’s business school, as well as a planned science and engineering complex and some arts facilities.

The university did not detail a timeline or price tag for the theater project, but said it expected that the A.R.T. would continue to present its work in Cambridge “for several years.”