W.C. Turck, a Chicago-based activist and playwright, has announced the premiere of The People's Republic of Edward Snowden, a comedic poke at the security state and spy culture through…
Just as its film predecessor showed a whole different way a movie musical could work, the Tony Award-winning Once reshapes our expectations of what a Broadway musical looks and feels like.
A profoundly moving piece of theater. Highly Recommended.
Otello kicks off the Lyric season with panache, proving once again why it is America's premier opera house. Not only is their cast stellar, but they have depth on the bench ready to dress an…
Hubbard Street's 2013 Fall Series is a painting of thought processes mingled with pure passion, coming together to create an exciting, thoroughly satisfying program. (read more...)
There is something about the way the members of Hubbard Street Dance Chicago move onstage that suggests they just might have developed some uncannyability to share neurons. They are just so …
A ZOMBIE MUSICAL THAT NEEDS BRAINS There's something wrong with a show that demands you be drunk. On opening night the howling fans of this cult phenom, now in its fourth incarnation (if tha…
The new book "Bigger, Brighter, Louder" recalls Claudia Cassidy and others who wrote the first draft of Chicago's theater history.
Can a man and woman be attracted to one another, have a life-transforming friendship that betters both of them without consummating their relationship? That is the question that "Once" asks,…
In his first few weeks in Chicago, James Valenti has already done more than many people can fit into several months. The acclaimed Florida-based tenor, who stars in Lyric Opera of Chicago's …
LOVE IMITATES ART Ironically, the real-life love affair celebrated on film and in the theater by co-creators Glen Hasard, an Irish composer, and Marketa Irglova, a Czech songwriter, fizzled …
On Monday night, October 7, Broadway ledgend Chita Rivera returned to the stage in Chita A Legendary Celebration, which was produced by and benefits Broadway CaresEquity Fights AIDS. The eve…
Picking the upcoming opening nights. Picking the upcoming opening nights.
Productions of some musicals are like Original Cast Recordings that you don't play too often for fear they might get stale. When you do revisit them, you say, "Oh, right, that's why I liked …
World-renowned Irish super-group Celtic Thunder performs MYTHOLOGY live at the Chicago Theatre, 175 N. State, on Friday, Oct. 18 at 7:30pm, as  part of their Fall 2013 62-city Ca…
To mark Giuseppe Verdi's 200th birthday, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra will stream a live performance on Thursday.
FRIENDS DISCOVERING BENEFITS Familiarity needn't breed contempt. An old-fashioned "coming out" drama can reinvent the wheel with charm enough to distract from any cloying sense of déjà v…
Indie-folk band and theatre troupe PigPen Theatre Company, who were seen Off-Broadway with The Old Man and The Old Moon, has released "The Way I'm Running," a five-song EP of n…
Sometimes Chicago Shakespeare produces bold reinventions of classics. Other times it brings in world-theater innovators as one of the most globally minded cultural entities in Chicago. And t…
ROMANCE MEETS REALITY Written early but published posthumously (1817), Jane Austen's most comical novel, Northanger Abbey, works equally well as a literary satire and a psychologically probi…
By Hugh Iglarsh Seen from below, from the viewpoint of the victimized and marginalized, the city takes on a permanent twilight glow, as bright promise meets dark, hard realities. This is the…
It's already October (although you wouldn't know it from the still-green foliage and the humid 80 degree temperature over the weekend). Where did this year go? I like October though …
CLUELESS CORRUPTION Much has been said about Neil LaBute’s work at Profiles, but there's so much that can't be given away about Wrecks (2005), a 70-minute solo show by the ever-cont…
With Anthony Burgess' translation of the ultimate rom-com tear-jerker, Chicago Shakespeare mounts a sumptuous love story on a scale as monumental as the unfortunate snout of it titular hero.…
RECOMMENDED Between Aspen Sante Fe Ballet and Hubbard Street's fall program, audiences have the opportunity to see not one but two Chicago premieres from Alejandro Cerrudo, Hubbard Street's …