Search Results for: tug of war

Neil LaBute’s latest, Reasons to be Pretty, now in a strong staging at Profiles Theatre in a Chicago premiere, is a departure from the downer works LaBute has penned recently. This work is hopeful as it becomes a moral awakening for Greg (Darrell W. Cox), the lead character and narrator. Reasons looks at how 21st Century language doesn’t seem to allow us to communicate our true feeling, often getting us into trouble when we use a term that we find expressive but others find that term/word offensive. Misinterpretation of words and phrases plays large in LaBute’s working class, blue collar relationship drama.

From the start, the orchestra and the exquisite Cats-like costumes (Matt Guthier) with wigs by Michael Buoninconto created the proper atmosphere for the Cats to roam. Once we learn about “The Naming of Cats,” we meet the old Gumbie cat and all of her friends all of whom aspire to be the cat selected by Old Deuteronomy to be reborn just before dawn.