THE HO– USE THAT WILL NOT STAND Stands Tall
Jacqueline Williams, Lizan Mitchell. Photo by Michael Courie What happens when people are too White to be Black and too Black to be White? Playwright Marcus Gardley’s THE HO– USE THAT WILL NOT STAND brings this conversation to the forefront in a dance with dialogue and history. There are advantages...
Mesmerizing HUMAN TERRAIN Is a Story That Needs to Be Told
Shozzett Silva and Kim Boler. Photo by Matthew Freer. Review: HUMAN TERRAIN at Broken Nose Theatre By Abigail Trabue Every so often a play falls into the right company at the right time and becomes the example of what Chicago storefront theater is all about. That play is HUMAN TERRAIN and that...
THADDEUS AND SLOCUM Wows at Lookingglass
It is highly likely that THADDEUS AND SLOCUM will be the most delightful entertainment you’ll see this summer. Stacked and packed with song and dance numbers, the new Lookingglass production explores racial inequalities in showbiz at the turn of the 20th century through heartfelt laughter and with vaudevillian proportions.
DIVINE SISTER is Divine at Hell in a Handbag
Chicago theater boasts no shortage of pop cultural parody shows, but Hell in a Handbag’s production of THE DIVINE SISTER rises above this description. In the grand camp tradition, playwright Charles Busch’s witty and raunchy send-up celebrates the peculiar fascination Hollywood held with nuns in the 1960s. And what better subjects could there be for female impersonation? Cloisters of chaste, devout, dramatic, beautiful characters ripe for fictional scandal. Busch’s script takes advantage of every nun cliche in the canon—visions from God, desperate campaigns to build a new school for the children (the children!) and of course, sexual liaisons between the sisters.
BAT BOY Provides Delectably Peculiar and Dark Musical Entertainment
Delightfully quirky and darkly comic, BAT BOY: THE MUSICAL makes its Chicago premiere in this Griffin Theatre production with direction by Scott Weinstein. The Den Theatre proves an ideal venue for this strange and wonderful musical with music and lyrics by Laurence O’Keefe and book by Keythe Farley and Brian Flemming. And Griffin Theatre’s ensemble delivers with vocal expertise and keen acting, milking the show’s material for maximum comedic value and audience delight.
XANADU is Unadulterated Musical Theater Joy
American Theater Company’s production of the musical XANADU (based upon the flop of a film bearing the same name) bursts with infectious energy and non-stop fun.
Poignant Tragedy SPINNING Unearths Haunting Empathy
Connor Burke is a man overcome with regret, clutching at the scraps of life that remain after catastrophe tears apart his world like a tortuous riptide.
Whimsical Roaming SHERLOCK Is the Perfect Summer Activity
Do you remember what it was like to see your world as a game? I picture myself as a child, a small flame-haired thing, running around heavily-wooded Defiance, Missouri, thinking my little universe is but an ever-stretching scene of discovery. An oddly shaped stone, a lost pen cap, the first summer firefly– everything in sight was a clue to unraveling the wonder of the everyday. I was happy to catch a glimpse of that feeling again this weekend with SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE MYSTERY OF PORTAGE PARK, watching merrily on as adults and children alike take delight in the seemingly ordinary world around them.
Deftly Crafted Would-Be Superheroes Fly in PROWESS
In a time when most storefronts have little faith in their audience to make it through 90 minutes without looking at their phone, Prowess flies through it’s 2+ hour run time.
DEATH AND HOUDINI Still Daring as Hell
At the House, they take great care of their audience. I usually shrink down in my seat at the thought of audience participation, but under Nathan Allen’s direction and Watkins’ mastery, to participate feels like we might be in on the trick.