Review: The Peculiar Grace of Terence Blanchard’s Fire Shut Up in My Bones at Lyric Opera
My first opera was at age 10 when our parish priest took us to see La Boheme at the Lyric Opera House. I always thought that opera was sung in […]
Kathy D. Hey writes creative non-fiction essays. A lifelong Chicagoan, she is enjoying life with her husband, daughter and three dogs in the wilds of Edgewater. When she isn’t at her computer, she is in her garden growing vegetables and herbs for kitchen witchery.
Review: Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater—Passion and Grace Wrought from a World in Chaos
We are living in a time of chaos and war while—maybe—emerging from a plague. There is no better balm for my soul than an evening in meditation on movement by […]
Review: Lost Souls and Collateral Damage in Ruined at Invictus Theatre
When a country is ravaged by war, various organizations publish pictures to horrify the viewer enough to give a tax-deductible donation. Send a check or a monthly donation and get […]
Review: Broken Nose Theatre Asks If the Cure Can Be Worse Than the Illness in This is Only a Test
I have not heard the air raid sirens in years. In the ’50s through the ’80s an air raid siren would blare every Tuesday morning at 10:30. It was heard […]
Review: Ballet Folklórico de México Is a Vivid and Entrancing Look at Mexican History
Spending time on the West Side of Chicago with my grandparents was an introduction to Mexican culture. They lived very close to 26th Street, which is part of Little Village. […]
Review: Powerhouse Voices Lift Mercury Theater’s Women of Soul
True confessions time. When I saw that Mercury Theater was doing a musical called Women of Soul, my curiosity was piqued. Musicals featuring soul music and powerhouse singing are the […]
Review: Queen of the Night Portrays a Healing Journey of a Father and Son
For some, growing up Black in America is to be a stranger to the concept of the All-American. As few as two generations back, a Black father was seen as […]
Review: Sons of Hollywood Reveals Hypocrisy and Defiance in Old Hollywood at Windy City Playhouse
As a fan and amateur historian of the film industry in America, I found Sons of Hollywood to be a heart-rending retelling of the lives of those who entertained millions […]
Review: Timeline Theatre’s Relentless Unburies the Past to Confront the Future
Bakari and Ladymore are brilliant as sisters. Annelle is the dilettante who has had two marriages before finding Marcus. She revels in being a doctor’s wife as much as being […]
Review: The Moors at A Red Orchid Is a Wickedly Funny and Subversive Tale of Longing
Ah, gothic romance. It is always a dark and stormy night with sexually repressed spinsters sitting in the parlor of a creaky old mansion with ivy growing inside. The winds […]
Review: Oklahoma! Takes Us to the Dark Side
Broadway revivals have been the lifeblood of musical theater for decades. They are, for the most part, feel-good reminders of the golden age of Broadway. Big voices such as Howard […]
Review: A Hero’s Journey for Alaudin Ullah in Dishwasher Dreams at Writers Theatre
Every first-generation person has a story of integrating the ways of the old country, or of their ancestral region like the American South. It is how identities are built and […]