Given the name of the company, Black Button Eyes Productions probably had a date from the beginning with Edgar Allan Poe. You know, that gent poetical who enjoyed the company of ravens and q…
On the day celebrating Martin Luther King, Jr., Chicago said farewell to Lew Manilow, one of the more formidable Chicagoans of his generation. Manilow, who died Dec. 9 at the age of 90, was …
"My name is Lorraine Hansberry. I am a writer. I was born on the South Side of Chicago. I was born black and a female. I was born in a Depression after one World War and came into my adolesc…
Of all the Founding Fathers of these United States, Benjamin Franklin probably did more than any other to articulate the enlightened idea of America, to explicitly link his yoked but emergin…
Robert O'Hara wrote "Insurrection: Holding History" in 1996 when he was just 26 years old. At the time, the play was billed as "Roots" meets "The Wizard of Oz" " they did what they had to do…
When the Minnesota Vikings took a knee and declined to attempt the extra point Sunday, you likely were unmoved by the decision, since the Vikings already had won their game by five points an…
After 19 years in the job, Dorothy Milne is calling it quits as artistic director of the Lifeline Theatre in Rogers Park. In an interview with the Tribune, Milne, 60, expressed a desire "not…
A generation from now, cultural historians will look back on this moment in Chicago theater and marvel at all the plays about small-town Americans tearing each other apart. Hot on the heels …
The antagonist of Loy Webb's intense new drama from the New Colony, "The Light," is seen only in conversation. He's a Chicago music artist, known only as Kashif, the kind that this city like…
On Wednesday, the Marcus Center in Milwaukee, the Overture Center for the Arts in Madison and the Fox Cities Performing Arts Center in Appleton, Wis., all said they would host the hit musica…
On March 10, 1985, Tribune columnists Michael Sneed and Cheryl Lavin announced that an actress named Molly Regan had joined the ensemble of the Steppenwolf Theatre Company. Regan's calling c…
Mercury, meet your new sister, Venus. The long-anticipated new theater-cabaret space carved out of the shell of the old Cullen's Bar on Southport Avenue in Lakeview, and named after the plan…
When August Wilson wrote "Jitney," a play that now is 35 years old and predates Lyft, Uber and all of Wilson's other major works, the idea of penning a cycle that reflected the African-Ameri…
What is the responsibility of an arts organization to its local community? The answer to that question is far more complicated than you might think. And it is a key part of the legacy of Ste…
Chicago's Lookingglass Theatre Company announced a new executive director on Thursday: Rachel L. Fink. Fink, most recently managing director of the Theatre Bay Area service organization, pre…
Happy New Year, theater lovers! What do you have to look forward to in the first weeks of 2018 in Chicago theater? Let me begin with shows that might get your 2018 started in the right key. …
Stephen J. Albert, the executive director of Court Theatre in Hyde Park, a nationally respected nonprofit theater executive and a man of creative passion and evangelical energy, died Friday …
Before 2017, the Chicago actress Carrie Coon was, in her own words, "an indie cult favorite who does not sell any tickets." During 2017, this Wicker Park resident, this now-pregnant Wicker P…
Exit, 2017. But first ... New Year's Day a year ago heralded an acrimonious end for "Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind" at the Neo-Futurarium, with a venerable company at odds with Greg…
"Remember," a father says to a son. "Our hearts and our bodies are given to us only once. ... And before you know it, your heart is worn out. And, as for your body, there comes a point when …
Lists are fun. More importantly, they represent a chance to celebrate excellence. Hence my annual look at the 10 best performances in homegrown Chicago theater in 2017. (Sorry, Nick Cartell …
Aziza Barnes' "BLKS" begins with the sudden appearance of a genital mole. But this poignant blast of a comedy at the Steppenwolf Theatre is really all about that time in your life when what …
Black Ensemble Theater's "Sammy: The Story of Sammy Davis, Jr." opened Sunday under the title "Sammy: A Tribute to Sammy Davis, Jr." I suspect one of the legal keepers of the legacy made a c…
With "operatic" now a synonym for excessive grandiosity, and the demanding diva de rigueur for any opera, it is easy to forget the primal, visceral nature of the early years of the art. To p…
The year 2017 was a year of disruption. This was not the best of times, but a season of justified outrage, of mealy-mouthed apology, of communicative disarray. No surprise, then, that the be…