A JUICY CLUSTER OF APES There are no simians in Apes of Wrath, Second City e.t.c.'s new revue at Pipers Alley"but then, as always, the jokes are on us. The vague premise behind this trenchan…
ORPHANS OF THE RICH No one captures the volatile complexity and fragile bravado of mixed-up young adults better than the angry young plays of the 20th century. In Look Back in Anger, Dealer'…
A FEMINIST FANTASY SOAKED IN WHIMSY In Lifeline Theatre's semi-delightful 150-minute romp, the war between the sexes is replaced by a war against sexism. The latest adaptation from this lite…
A THREE-HOUR HOME RUN Clearly and cleanly, tried and true director/choreographer Kevin Bellie trusts the heart out of Adler and Ross' 1952 Broadway classic. Damn Yankees, Light Opera Works' …
HEARKENING BACK TO HAPPY HARMONIES Too sweet to be termed a blast from the past, Theo Ubique Cabaret Theatre's latest reclamation brings back, with all their pep, pizzazz and patriotism, the…
CYBER COMPASSION, OR PIXELS FAKE PASSION Like his equally probing The Day of the Locust, Nathanael West's 1933 novella Miss Lonelyhearts all but skewers its subject: the loneliness of crowds…
HOME LOST HOME A world premiere from Sideshow Theatre Company, this curious and lengthy offering feels as familiar as it is threatening. In 145 minutes Kathleen Ackerley (who also co-directs…
CHINA SOARS OVER LAKE MICHIGAN For a ninth consecutive summer, Cirque Shanghai (its title actually referring to whatever Chinese city produces these performers) has returned to the well-name…
WILL WONDERS NEVER CEASE? No question, Black Ensemble Theatre's latest offering boasts the usual superb quality control of sounds and notes, casting, performance, ensemble rapport, and music…
NOT SINCE THE REAGAN ERA Alas, it's been 30 years since Paul Taylor Dance Company last played Chicago's Auditorium Theatre. Even more alas, the too-brief weekend return ends today, May 28. A…
AN ANCIENT SWEETNESS ON A GOODMAN STAGE Infatuated with alteration, Tony-winner Mary Zimmerman loves transformations, metamorphoses, shape-shifting, and slow to rapid mood swings. Nothing sh…
BEYOND THE BREACH It honors the text. That's praise enough for any production, especially when the drama is the world's greatest propaganda play:Â Henry V. Shakespeare's most patriotic wor…
MELTING JIGS INTO DIRGES Whether it's a Jewish family in Awake and Sing! or a black one in A Raisin in the Sun, poverty grinds down its unloved ones and prejudice finishes the ki…
PROKOFIEV GETS POLITICAL This is not your usual Romeo and Juliet. Truncated and concentrated, Joffrey Ballet's U.S. premiere of Krzysztof Pastor's two-act treatment of Profofiev's celebrated…
WHEN THE MIDDLE CLASS MATTERED The best thing about this well-earned, state-of-the-art revival of Frank Loesser’s Pulitzer-winning masterwork is this: Â No one dared to update what m…
NO CLOSURE IN BIRMINGHAM Originally produced at Goodman Theatre in 1989, Sally Nemeth's incendiary two-act, 125-minute Mill Fire depicts the origins and aftermath of its title disaster. This…
CHARLES DARWIN AND NATURAL AFFECTION With its intentionally contradictory title, In the Garden: A Darwinian Love Story is not about the Garden of Eden; it is an earnest but unengrossing w…
PREHISTORIC PERSPECTIVE ON THE PRESENT Extended until mid-May, Theater Wit's Midwest debut of Madeleine George's sharp new show has clearly touched hearts and nerves. It's no secret: Full of…
MATCHMAKERS GET BURNED In the social maze of Regency England, where any successful matrimony required sexual politics and emotional intrigue, novelist Jane Austen understood how love gets lo…
RECRUITING FOR THE 1% Hungarian playwright Ferenc Molnár is much better known for the spindrift, gossamer pleasures of his Liliom (which inspired Carousel) and The Good Fairy (which ga…
A WILD(E) ADAPTATION A spectacle that swirls and thrills, The House Theatre of Chicago's Dorian has updated Oscar Wilde's classic cautionary tale from Victorian music halls to today's club s…
THE CONDITIONAL KINDNESS OF STRANGERS An episodic evening set in and around a hotel near O'Hare Airport, Marisa Wegrzyn’s itinerant one-act both celebrates and red-flags those encou…
WATCHING LOSERS LOSE IS A LOSE/LOSE SITUATION After a brief show of compassion for life's casualties and some welcome sympathy for the underdog in Good People and The Motherfucker with the H…
THE BANALITY OF SURVIVAL A crowded creation, Our Class remembers the Holocaust by forgetting nothing. Intent on conscience-keeping, burning to reclaim a slice of history, this dogged docudra…
FREED FROM A CELLAR The inception of this 2006 work from Chicago's neighborhood-based Albany Park Theater Project is a remark made by a 14-year-old member of their youth ensemble: "I learned…