Tom Williams In Christina Anderson’s interesting play, Blacktop Sky, we meet 18 year old Ida (Kristin E. Ellis), a resident of a Chicago housing project. she slowly befriends a young homeless man who lives on a bench in the project’s courtyard after she witness police rough up a fellow project resident
The Fall of Heaven can be enjoyed on several levels: it is a morality play (good vs. evil); a human comedy; and a hopeful tribute to humanity. it is also as finely constructed and stage theatrical production. Congo Square proves once more that they produce outstanding theatre. Don’t miss this unique show.
In Simon Block’s telling adaptation of Jonathan Safran For’s novel, Everything is Illuminated, a 20something American Jewish boy travels to the Ukraine with only a yellowing photograph in hand. He is Jonathan (Brad Smith) and he is in search of the woman, Augustine, who saved his grandfather form death at the hands of the invading Nazis.
Lee Blessing calls his A Body of Water as puzzle play; that sure is accurate. When a middle aged couple awaken each day and don’t know who they are, where they are, or the why of anything, the mystery is presented. The couple struggles to discover what has happened to them. Fear and disorientation consumes them.
In Paul Edwards’ smart, nicely paced and well acted stage adaptation, Peyton Place unfolds as a period piece of life in the repressed 1950’s small town America. We meet three women coming to terms with their sexual identities. Constance MacKenzie (Sheila Willis) is an emotionally drained woman and mother to the sensitive and precious daughter Allison (Catherine Gillespie) – am aspiring writer. Add Selena Cross (Sara Renee Gilbert), the poor girl from the ‘shacks” and we have three microcosms of the emerging women of the ’50’s.
Mievelle calls The City & The City – “wired fiction” – sc-fic and fantasy meets horror meets ghost stories or some combination thereof. It is a mystery rapped into a location fantasy that often confuses more that enlightens despite a worthy cast of ten players who each give it a go.
What makes this cute and eye-popping techno production work (despite a computer crash) work is the terrific charming and totally honest performance by Matt Holzfeind as the nerdy wholesome nerd. We easily relate to Elliott as he works out his personal foibles involving his inability to sustain a romantic relationship. His possible soul mate, Molly, played with truthful ambivalence by Kristina Valada-Viars, seems also befuddled by her mixed feeling about romantic commitment.
Romeo and Juliet is an ideal gateway to the world of William Shakespeare for many a young theatergoer, and those wishing to inoculate wee ones early in the wonders of the Bard might do significantly worse than with Chicago Shakespeare’s 75-minute rendition of this much-loved tragedy.
25 Saints is a gritty, well paced, action-packed 75 minute one-act drama that depicts how desperate ignorant people can easily become violent when pushed to their boiling point. It is a grim look into the world of poverty that makes folks resort to crime and violence that we choose to ignore. 25 Saints is filled with powerful, well-executed stage combat and fine actin
Fox takes audiences on a sidesplitting romp which pulls the rug from underneath the stuffy denizens of a private golf country club. The 43rd annual grudge match between rival golf clubs is thrown for a loop when the best golfer switches teams on the eve of the competition. It’s a hilarious romp with classic elements like mistaken identities, huge consequences riding on the match’s outcome, marriages on the brink of disaster, and secret romantic shenanigans that recalls the Marx Brothers in their heyday. Add over-the-top characters, a furious pace, terrific physical comedy with brilliant plotting and fabulous comic touches by the expert cast and Fox is a well-oiled comic farce.