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 […]
Feature: Chicago Theaters on the Move as the Environment Changes …. Dramatically
Two lean years of pandemic economics, entwined with continuing, insistent calls for real racial justice and gender equity and an end to sexual abuse. The ‘20s have started as a […]
Review: Chicago Shakes Brings TM, a One-on-One Virtual Experience That Asks if You’re a Good Enough Person
Are you a good person? In TM, one spectator and one actor meet; the actor takes the spectator through a series of questions and exercises to determine if the spectator […]
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: Humans and Objects at Play by the Neo-Futurists as Chicago International Puppet Festival Continues
Andersonville’s Neo Futurarium is the kind of hole in the wall, warren of a creative space that has made this city famous as a cultural destination, so it’s some kind […]
Preview: Lifeline’s Fillet of Solo Festival Celebrates Personal—and Virtual—Storytelling
Lifeline Theatre has launched its 25th annual Fillet of Solo Festival for a three-week run of virtual storytelling by some of the most vibrant and creative storytellers from Chicago and […]
Review: Cabinet of Curiosity Sees Sea Change at Chicago Puppet Theater Fest
What I have always loved about every single Cabinet of Curiosity production is that I can’t tell you what it is about, but it holds tremendous meaning for me. Sea […]
Preview: Puppet Theater Festival Opens With the Social Commentary of The Plastic Bag Store
At long last the 4th annual Chicago International Puppet Theater Festival, after a COVID 19- induced delay, is here. If the opening of Robin Frohardt’s Plastic Bag Store on Michigan […]
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: Witness Binds a WW2 Tragedy With Present-Day Anti-Semitism Through Inventive Virtual Theater
The tragedy of the MS St. Louis, the 1939 ship bound for the U.S. with 937 European Jews on board, is the subject of a powerful new play by Arlekin […]