Review: Tennis’ Pollen Blooms at the Riviera Theater
Spring bloomed just in time for the Pollen tour to come through Chicago. The last time Denver Indie-pop duo Tennis played the Riviera Theater, they were opening up for HAIM […]
Review: Though Enjoyable to Look At, Paint Is a Comedy With Too Subtle Brush Strokes
Lest you think that the new Owen Wilson-starring film Paint is some veiled biopic of public television superstar Bob Ross, let me assure you that any similarities between Wilson’s Carl […]
Review: A Soldier’s Play, a Murder Mystery, Explores Racism Among the Military Yesterday….and Today
Near the end of A Soldier’s Play, set on a segregated Army base in the Jim Crow South in 1944, a white captain says to his Black counterpart, “I was wrong […]
Review: The High Art of Bach’s Passion of St. Matthew
There are many excellent classical music concerts presented in Chicago every year. But Music of the Baroque’s performance of Johann Sebastian Bach’s The St. Matthew Passion—conducted by Dame Jane Glover, […]
Review: The Super Mario Bros. Movie Features All the Characters, Set Pieces of the Storied Game, Just None of the Actual Story
And I thought I was a little bit lost during the recent Dungeons & Dragons movie. I don’t live under a rock, so I know a little something about the […]
Review: Nostalgic Nike Drama Air Chronicles the Story of Launching the Iconic Jordan Shoe
In the mid-1980s, Nike’s basketball shoe division was doing so poorly compared to Adidas and Converse that the company almost shut it down completely. They were struggling to find a […]
Review: Puddin’: The Autobiography of a Baby, A Memoir in Prose Poems, by Patrick T. Reardon
Puddin’ is a slim volume, small enough to tuck in a back pocket or a small purse. That size may suggest a good way to read this “memoir in prose poems” […]
Gallery: Saturday Cosplay at C2E2 2023
When you start talking about a return to normal, what does that mean? It really depends on the place and the vibe. For C2E2, this year feels like the first […]
Review: Tetris Pieces Together the Complicated Origin Story of the Classic Video Game
Born in the Netherlands, schooled in the United States, and living in Japan in the late 1980s, video game licenser Hank Rogers (Taron Egerton) doesn’t exactly seem like the most […]
Review: Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves Leans into Nerddom, Nostalgia and Humor for an Epic Adventure
I’m sure a lot of people who review this latest attempt at a Dungeons & Dragons movie are going to feel the need to tell you their history with the […]
Review: A Little Too Much of the Same in Dying for It by the Artistic Home
Although Semyon, played by Daniel Shtivelberg, the main character of Moira Buffini’s play Dying For It, lives in post-revolutionary Russia, his struggles are pointedly timeless and engender a theatergoer’s sympathy. […]
Review: Ibeyi’s Connection With Their Fans Highlights Their Magnificent Thalia Hall Set
It’s been a while since I had the chance to see Ibeyi perform; in fact it was all the way back in 2015 at Lincoln Hall when I got to […]