Economic impact was calculated using the amount spent by the arts institutions and by visitors, both "directly," at the arts venues and "indirectly," at other businesses such as restaurants,…
The Black Ensemble Theater has long been a reliable destination for original, larger-than-life biographical musicals about larger-than-life artistic icons. Next year, upon the completion of …
I included the n-word in my review of Court Theatre's Guess Who's Coming to Dinner. A lot of people let me know I shouldn't have. You're right.…
This year marks the 50th anniversary of many landmark cultural events (the original release of 2001: A Space Odyssey, the Broadway debut of Hair, the release of the Beatles' White Album, etc…
In Long Way Home, the theater group Q Brothers Collective creates a contemporary mix on Homer's epic The Odyssey: instead of hyper-masculine white men slaying mythical creatures or stirring …
Following the February 14 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, in Parkland, Florida, student survivors wasted no time mobilizing their fight for gun control through the Never Ag…
There's a notion in Jewish mysticism that the Torah appears in different forms in different eras, depending on how much the people of that era can absorb"a collection of fables, say, at one …
Steppenwolf Theatre Company announced today that actors Celeste M. Cooper and Cliff Chamberlain will join the nearly 50-member ensemble. Cooper made her Steppenwolf debut in BLKS and Chamber…
Rhinofest turns 29 this year and remains one of the only fringe festivals in the US that actively curates its acts instead of selecting them through a lottery.…
We should have known about John Mahoney. He left plenty of clues. Only last fall, he appeared onstage at Steppenwolf Theatre, where he'd been an ensemble member since the late 70s, in…
Veteran actor John Mahoney has died, it was confirmed late Monday. He was 77. The actor, best-known for his role on the hit TV series Frasier, was also an ensemble member of Chicago's Ste…
The set for Mikhail Baryshnikov's tribute to Joseph Brodsky consists of a structure resembling a ruined old greenhouse"something you might picture surviving in a neglected corner of the Rany…
Putting together one musical is hard. Wrangling multiple original productions from different creators and producers sounds like a nightmare, but it's how Underscore Theatre Company advances …
Anna Ziegler's 2016 play fictionalizes the case of David Reimer, born in 1965, who had the misfortune of becoming a living laboratory for theories about gender. Like Reimer, Ziegler's Adam T…
I don't want to make overblown claims for Loy Webb's new play, The Light. It's got its problems.…
Andy Warhol once observed that "dying is the most embarrassing thing that could ever happen to you because someone has got to take care of all your details. You'd like to do them all yoursel…
Last fall, in the vein of its long-running, now-retired Sketchbook festival, the social-issues-focused theater group Collaboraction brought together more than 200 artists to share 24 short "…
When we first catch sight of her, waiting at a Greyhound Bus stop in the mountain hamlet of Spruce Pine, North Carolina (which actually exists, by the way), the eponymous 25-year-old heroine…
Want proof that context is everything? Consider the Hypocrites' Dracula.…
Myrna Salazar was in Houston the day I talked to her by phone, with a lot to worry about. She has family in Puerto Rico"including her mother, whom, she said, she was trying to get off the hu…
What are you doing for Banned Books Week this year? It's not like you don't have choices.…
Back in 1992, just after she'd published her first book, Feminist Fatale, and became the de facto spokeswoman for Gen X feminists, Paula Kamen appeared on a panel about feminism past and pre…
Keep the faith, Chicago theater lovers. If your trust in the integrity of Steppenwolf and Tracy Letts was in any way shaken by the tortured, execrable sitcom CBS rendered from their Chicago-…
In the two years since the secret Not in Our House Facebook group was formed, a number of things have changed. Chief among them is that Profiles Theatre no longer exists.…
In the wake of a tumultuous presidential election, this year's One-Minute Play Festival at the Den Theatre puts politics at center stage. In its seventh year, the festival"this edition is ti…