FIRST FOLIO MOVES THEIR BLOOMIN' FARCE INTO HIGH GEAR Unnecessary Farce is that rarest of theatrical birds: a farce that is actually funny. Sure, it's silly to the max, but it makes the audi…
MIST OPPORTUNITY I was troubled after the opening of the West Coast Premiere of Chicago playwright Keith Huff's A Steady Rain at Marin Theatre Company. I couldn't shake the feeling that this…
ART OR NOT, IT'S A FUN PLAY Yasmina Reza's oft-produced Art (English translation by Christopher Hampton) may be singularly responsible for the current plethora of new plays today billed as "…
WHEN RECOMMENDATIONS DON’T TURN OUT AS HOPED FOR Aaron Feldman, the charismatic, bright, and privileged protagonist of Jonathan Caren's promising but highly unwieldy new play The Recom…
ALL IN ZI FAMILY In Russian Transport, comedienne Janeane Garofalo expands her range by playing a wisecracking Russian-Jewish matriarch whose domineering attitude toward her daughter conceal…
IDIOT IS AS IDIOT DOES Inspired by a 2004 rock album by the American punk rock band Green Day, American Idiot has received its share of positive reviews since its premiere in Berkeley, Calif…
IS THERE A RECONCILIATION IN SIGHT? Every dedicated theatergoer should attend both Race at the Goodman Theatre, and Disgraced " which just opened at the American Theater Company, even though…
WOMEN BEHAVING BADLY Attend the Profiles Theatre production of Leslye Headland's Bachelorette and meet Gena, Katie, and Regan " three foul-mouthed, pot smoking, cocaine sniffing, pill poppin…
PHOTO REALISM Time Stands Still has only four characters and a single set, but it covers an immense amount of dramatic ground, exploring personal matters of love and commitment while address…
THE SHOW ABOUT THE HAND THAT GIVES YOU THE FINGER I get a thrill when I think of the tourists who are milling about Old Town in San Diego. Exhausted from tchotchke shopping and sugary treats…
THE FEATS OF THE FOOTES America is preoccupied with an unstable economy, tax increases, oil profiteering, cash deficiencies, and the plummeting worth of real estate. Yet history does indeed …
THE SILLY BLONDE MUSICAL THAT ACTUALLY WORKS Local musical productions will have problems hiring skilled and energetic young performers for the next couple of months. The Chicagoland talent …
EXCELLENCE VS. HOKUM With Lonesome Traveler, a compendium of the golden years of American folk music, writer/director James O'Neil has developed a long-winded and incoherent revue that is mo…
BECKY SHAW WON'T LET YOU FORGET HER " THAT'S A PROMISE AND A THREAT I'm pleased to report that Becky Shaw is not easy to sit through. Five well-chiseled characters (that you pray you will ne…
HERE COMES MR. JORDAN Have you ever been to a sultry party that has the oppressive feel of a languid, humid day in the Deep South, only to have the energy shift dramatically when a raconteur…
WHOSE ETHNIC HERITAGE IS IT, ANYWAY? Black Pearl Sings! is a two-hander that explores the odd couple relationship between a black woman in prison for murder and a white female academic in Te…
A FEAST FOR THE SENSES (LEAVE YOUR MIND BEHIND) Chicago's Redmoon Company is famous for its work in puppet theater. The Chicago Shakespeare Theater is the preeminent classical theater in the…
MAMET CONFRONTS RACISM David Mamet's Race looks at the racial situation in this country and sees an unbridgeable chasm between blacks and whites in our society. It's a bleak vision, fortunat…
INVISIBLE MAN IS DIFFICULT TO SEE Invisible Man is a complex, panoramic, symbolic novel that's an unlikely candidate for adaptation to the stage. It's a sprawling work crowded with character…
KLEA BLACKHURST IS QUEEN OF THIS GYPSY Gypsy is a musical theater biography of striptease performer Gypsy Rose Lee; but it's really about Gypsy's mother, Mama Rose, immortalized by Ethel Mer…
CHEATED OF FEATURE The joy of watching Shakespeare in performance largely depends on the ensemble’s ability to make sense of the language. In this regard, Sacred Fools’ new R…
IF THIS IS THE CIRCUS, WHERE’S MY BREAD? In 1992, Guy Laliberté gentrified the big top with Saltimbanco, offering pure spectacle at Wagnerian prices, and in the process conflating art…
THE NATURALIST THING TO DO In the late 19th century, Naturalism emerged as a viable theatrical style in response to the artifice that had earlier been in vogue. It was almost inevitable …
DECIDING THE FATE OF BLACK MEN IN BASEBALL In 1947, Jackie Robinson broke the color line in major league baseball, the first black man in modern baseball history to play in the majors. That'…
THIS SHOWGIRL NEVER AGES For the typical visitor, Don Arden's Jubilee! is what Las Vegas entertainment is all about " spectacle, elegance, and acres of nubile topless young ladies descending…