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.
Read More25 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
Read MoreIn the last analysis, I find myself sympathetic to Shinn’s project. As DOMA goes to the Supreme Court and as states for the first time reject constitutional amendments banning gay marriage, insisting too stridently on inherited narratives of “queer victimhood” feels forced and disingenuous. Queer people—no longer uniformly marginalized to the closet—have an opportunity to recast themselves as committed agents of social change. The implications for queer storytelling are immense. Unfortunately, Teddy Ferrara doesn’t quite pick up on them.
Read MoreWithout Davenport serving as a much-needed emotional anchor, there is little to bring us into the story’s unfolding details. Even tensions between Davenport and the white Captain Charles Taylor (played by Tim Walsh with a Gomer Pyle-esque boobery) fail to elicit anything more than a few reactionary chuckles from the audience. Major plot points feel as though they’re mumbled through
Read MoreFox 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.
Read MoreIt sure seems that prolific playwright Don Nigro has the self referential dialog of those tongue-in-cheek mystery films from the ’40 & ’50’s down pat. His world premiere, City of Dreadful Night is a smart, coy, and full engaging 90 minute mystery reminiscent of Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, and James M. Cain novels turn into black and white films.
Read MoreAmerican politicians are sold to us as though they were tubes of toothpaste, and Mr. Munby’s Cesar looks to be no different. But the whole thing feels a touch too ironic, too cheeky, as we soon suspect the image of Cesar—like that of all great American politicians—to be infinitely more impressive than the man himself. Yet if Brutus is to enact a genuine tragedy, then Cesar must be no less than he claims: “…constant as the northern star,/ Of whose true-fix’d and resting quality/ There is no fellow in the firmament.” After all, there is no hero’s dignity in slaying an upstart impostor.
Read MoreI grew up listening to Billie Holiday records so I am quite familiar with her unique blues-oriented distinct jazz singing style. I can state with absolute certainty that Alexis Rogers has Billie Holiday’s style down pat. Add her fabulously realistic acting deftly depicting the pain Billie suffered as she tried to blunt reality with heron and whiskey and Rogers combines her amazing channeling of Holiday’s singing style with a sting of personal stories about the horrors of her life.
Read MoreDispensing with an overt critique of the American foreign policy establishment, BTBZ is about the faces on the ground and their baser instincts for blood, sex, power, and money that threaten to overwhelm them in the aftermath of anarchy. But what, the Tiger asks, might ultimately be said of God’s nature in the face of such wrath and violence? Atheism, in this case, would be the more comforting (if less convincing) position. The darker truth, as BTBZ only intimates, is that God is Himself a warrior—one who, on occasion, demands blood sacrifice.
Read MoreCovering three worlds: adolescent high school cultural, the events surrounding the Columbine Shootings, and the thirteen-year aftermath, Columbinus runs 2 hours and 43 minutes making it an exhaustive affair. My main problem with this production is its length and the over theatricality of parts of the show.
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