RECOMMENDED There are a lot of things about "Direct from Death Row: The Scottsboro Boys (An Evening of Vaudeville and Sorrow)” that are huge in scope, aside from its title. The play co…
RECOMMENDED With only three months left in 2015, I am pretty sure that I can safely dub "Miss Buncle's Book" at Lifeline Theatre one of my favorite plays of the year. I cannot be sure it wil…
RECOMMENDED There is something pleasing about attending a solid production of a modern warhorse of a musical. There is something comfortable and enjoyable about laughing along at jokes that …
RECOMMENDED Parenting is not an easy road to travel, generally. Throw into the mix a child who believes himself (or herself) to be of the sex that they weren't born as, and the road is sudde…
RECOMMENDED As a critic, I get to see a lot of good shows. I also get to see a lot of bad shows. It just about evens out in the end. Every once in a while I see a show that stands out above …
RECOMMENDED Exploring classic works by revisiting them in new forms can be exceptionally enlightening, and this is especially true with The House Theatre's newest offering, "The Revel." By a…
RECOMMENDED The premise of "The Producers" is based on a truth of theater production that is stretched to absurdity. It's very easy to lose money when producing plays. Many investors in Broa…
In the world of Chicago theater, it is customary to do a few previews before opening to the public, the critics and the JEFF Committee. Doing so allows a play to get on its feet and to be a …
In music, an interval is the space between two notes. For various reasons certain intervals inspire pleasant emotions, positive reactions. Other intervals are more apt to be heard as conflic…
Nicky Silver's scripts are always a little bit absurd, focused on the dynamics of close personal relationships and absolutely brilliant. Over the past couple of years, AstonRep Theatre Compa…
There is a generation of theatrical composers who have now been raised on the sounds of "Rent." And not unlike those young playwrights who have for years been trying to emulate David Mamet's…
Nikolai Gogol wrote a short story entitled “The Overcoat” in the mid-nineteenth century about a Russian bureaucrat whose cloak is ratty and in need of replacement if his career i…
RECOMMENDED Aliens and hillbillies in a musical together. That's what you get when you go to see "It Came from Kentucky" at The Annoyance Theatre. Initially, you might think that this is a p…
RECOMMENDED Harold Pinter's plays often seem longer than they are thanks to the fact that he intentionally calls for prolonged pauses and silences within his scripts. Because of this, those …
Back in my college days, I attended a sizable number of history and political science lectures as a Theatre and Poli-sci double major. I would have been thrilled if any of those lectures had…
RECOMMENDED With four mismatched chairs on the stage of Rivendell Theatre's cramped Edgewater space, Jeff Bowen and Hunter Bell's "[title of show]" is set within environs which contribute to…
RECOMMENDED You know what "Men of Soul" is? It's a whole lot of fun. The newly put together musical revue of hits from the sixties through the early nineties is an evening's worth of nostalg…
RECOMMENDED There is something magical about sitting in an audience and witnessing the moment that a piece of theater officially becomes dated. Despite being twenty years old, Guillermo Reye…
As the lights come up on the first scene of "Black River Falls," a refreshing bit of father-son banter places us firmly in 1978. Dad (Matt Rieger) sits on the couch watching football as his …
There could be many reasons to entitle a play "A Work of Art," but by doing so the author is either telling you that the play is about a piece of art, whether real or figurative, or the auth…
Early in their studies, young actors often run into what are called A/B Scenes or contentless scenes. These are back-and-forth bits of dialogue that leave everything so undefined that the wo…
Light Opera Works has launched it’s thirty-fifth season with a musical that has a great deal of staying power of its own. “The Fantasticks” has the honor of being the longe…
RECOMMENDED Beth Henley's modern classic "Crimes of the Heart" won a Pulitzer Prize and is a perennial favorite at theaters across the country. So, the final show of Step Up Production's sea…
RECOMMENDED Donny Hathaway is one of the many popular musical geniuses who died too young. His voice was smooth and soulful, and his career was headed upward when he took his own life in 197…
Chicago, as you may be aware, is the center of the universe when it comes to improvised sketch comedy. Stages are filled nightly by young comedians who are trying really hard to break into t…