If you’re looking for a little baseball‑themed entertainment this summer, you could skip the Friendly Confines or Sox Park (currently its tenants are in FIRST PLACE in the AL Central?!) and head up to Howard Street, where Theo is offering a revival of the American musical gem Damn Yankees. It’s a small‑room staging with a young, eager cast and a clear affection for the show’s place in musical‑theater history, and that affection carries it a long way.
Based on the Faust legend (via Douglass Wallop’s 1954 novel The Year the Yankees Lost the Pennant), Damn Yankees follows Joe Boyd, a middle‑aged Washington Senators fan who trades his soul for a shot at beating the Yankees. Premiering in 1955 under George Abbott—who co‑wrote the book with Wallop—the show featured a score by Adler and Ross, then riding high from Pajama Game. It also marked the first major pairing of Bob Fosse and Gwen Verdon and produced standards like “Heart” and “Whatever Lola Wants.” It’s a time capsule now, but a likable one, and Theo’s production leans into the material’s good humor rather than trying to modernize it.
A 1958 film version preserved Fosse’s choreography, Verdon’s sly brilliance, and Ray Walston’s definitive turn as the diabolical Mr. Applegate. The 1994 Broadway revival—starring Bebe Neuwirth (pre‑Chicago stardom) and Victor Garber, with Rob Marshall supplying updated choreography—introduced the show to a new generation. With that lineage in mind, Theo’s production, directed by Daryl D. Brooks, approaches the material with clear affection, focusing less on scale and more on the show’s essential spirit. Music direction is by Ryan Brewster and choreography by Christopher Chase Carter. Set design is by Manuel Ortiz with lighting design by Ellie Fey and costumes by Marquecia Jordan.
What gives this production its heart isn’t the ball field—rendered here in affectionate miniature to fit Theo’s compact space—but the marriage at its center. Thomas M. Shea’s Joe Boyd and Megan Hoyt’s Meg create a quietly sturdy, lived‑in partnership, the kind of relationship that makes the pain of Joe’s impossible bargain plainly legible. From that plaintive foundation, show leads Luke Nowakowski and Jenny Couch further highlight what’s really at stake, something far more consequential than a baseball championship. Nowakowski’s earnest, clean‑voiced Joe Hardy and Couch’s flashier, sharp‑edged Lola play as bright, necessary contrasts to the grounded domestic world Joe risks losing.
The show’s comic spark comes from the Senators themselves, played here with an easy, good‑natured swagger. Jon Parker Jackson, Jacob Merschel, Spencer Curtis, Brady Magruder, and Quinn Rigg supply the evening’s sharpest bursts of energy, tossing off their locker‑room banter with crisp timing and dancing with an appealing looseness. Their numbers have a buoyant, rough‑and‑ready charm that fits the material, and the five of them give the production much of its personality.
There’s also something genuinely heartening about Theo choosing to revisit a mid‑century musical like Damn Yankees. In a storefront space better known for cabaret pieces, giving audiences a chance to rediscover the show’s many charms—its wit, its warmth, its Fosse fingerprints—feels like a small act of stewardship. Brooks’s direction plays a key role in that, guiding the material with a light, confident hand that lets the show’s virtues speak for themselves. It’s a reminder that these mid‑century shows still have plenty to offer when approached with care.
So thanks to Theo for taking a swing at this mid‑century crowd‑pleaser and giving a new crowd the chance to spend a couple of hours with these boys of summer. There’s something refreshing about seeing a small company lean into a classic and trust its simple, durable pleasures. And in the end, whether on the ballfield or in the marriage at the center of the story, the message is the same: you gotta have heart. Damn Yankees runs through July 5 at Theo’s Fred Anzevino Theatre (721 Howard St, Evanston). Tickets are available at www.theo‑u.com.
For more information on this and other productions, see theatreinchicago.com.
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