True confession. I was a nerdy kid who loved bugs. I collected caterpillars with colorful spikes on their heads. I would put them in shoeboxes to watch the egg, cocoon, […]
A triangle has three sides. But the three sides are not always equal, as we learn in maths. Or geometry, if you’re an American. And so it is in Betrayal, the […]
One of the great things about plays from past centuries is that they can be restaged or updated in different eras, with different genders and colorblind casting. Shakespeare’s work lends […]
After much too long a pause, Lookingglass is back. And with style. Circus Quixote, Lookingglass Theatre’s adaptation of Miguel de Cervantes’ classic novel, Don Quijote of La Mancha, is a […]
Hubbard Street Dance Chicago is in its 47th year of cutting-edge performances and innovations in modern dance. The Winter Series at the Harris Theater Millennium Park opens with a dance that melds […]
The script of Sam Shepard’s romantic drama Fool For Love begins with the stage direction, “This play is be performed relentlessly, without a break.” The superb actors at Steppenwolf Theatre […]
I have always viewed dance as an art of structure and discipline. Traditional ballet has an ethereal quality—tulle and tights with hands just so. Complexions Contemporary Ballet performed at the […]
James Baldwin is the greatest American writer. Period. Even more so during Black History Month 2025. Among Baldwin’s many, many gifts was prescience. As a gay Black midcentury man, he […]
The new production of The Mannequins’ Ball at Trap Door Theatre is a whole lot of 1930s agitprop choreographed with music, singing and dancing. Nicole Weisner and Miguel Long direct 90 minutes […]
Kenneth Lonergan’s Lobby Hero blends working relationships tested by an ethical dilemma in this comedic drama that gets a timely staging by Shattered Globe Theatre. Is the titular Lobby Hero the loopy […]
The second and final week of the 7th Chicago International Puppet Theater Festival concluded yesterday, after 12 days of international puppet theater productions at dozens of venues plus free neighborhood […]
Fat Ham, the prize-winning play by James Ijames, is now on stage at Goodman Theatre in a co-production with Definition Theatre. Ijames’ script was inspired by Shakespeare’s Hamlet and incorporates some of the original’s […]