- Victory Gardens Theater is replacing Chicago is Burning, the last production of their 2012-13 season, with a new play by Associate Artist Luis Alfaro, entitled Mojada.
Daily Rehearsal: Victory Gardens replaces 'Chicago is Burning' with 'Mojada', set in Pilsen
Nov. 2, 2012Daily Rehearsal: Mike Daisey brings 'American Utopias' to the MCA
Nov. 1, 2012
- Could there ever be another article about Mike Daisey without mention of This American Life and Apple? At least for now, no. Daisey is currently in Chicago for his piece American Utopias, which opens at the MCA Thursday, co-presented by the Chicago Humanities Festival.
Murder most foul in Middle America
Nov. 1, 2012
Wasteland, TimeLine Theatre Company, 615 West Wellington (at Broadway), 773-281-TIME, Wednesdays-Sundays through December 30, $32-$42
William Brown's unsentimental direction makes the world premiere of Susan Felder's two-man play — one man onstage, one man a disembodied voice — a relentlessly intense experience, turning those black POW-MIA flag from an abstraction into flesh-and-blood reality. Two guys named Joe find themselves in neighboring cells (or, rather, underground tiger-cages) and come to rely on each other as the sole source of sanity in an apparently endless captivity. Nate Burger captures the visible Joe's desperation with every move, word and gesture, while Steve Haggard gives a fully realized performance with just his voice, making the invisible Joe his brother's keeper and tormentor in equal measure. Sartre's No Exit has nothing on this: you won't breathe for the entire show, or for several hours afterwards.
Daily Rehearsal: 'Faith Healer' remounts at the Den Theatre
Oct. 31, 2012
- Coming after the New Year: Carlos Mencia and Nick Kroll (of FX's The League) head to UP.
- The Den Theatre is remounting Brian Friel's Faith Healer starting in December. According to the Den, the play previously "played to sold-out houses" at both TurnAround Theatre and Steppenwolf in 1995.
What is America most afraid of? Carousels, high schools and our own children
Oct. 31, 2012Dana Norris, the founder and host of Story Club, reviewed Silent Hill 3D, Paranormal Activity and Sinister for Halloween. What did she learn? In 2012, America has been the most afraid of moving to a new house or town, carousels and our own children, among other things.
Read an excerpt below, or listen above:
I hate horror movies because I don’t need them. I know that other people get a delicious thrill from being scared but that's only because they’re not normally scared, but I start out scared. I wake up every morning and walk to the "L" thinking,“Is someone going to hit me in the back of the head with a brick?”
But I think that horror movies are important. Maybe they show us something about ourselves, what we all, as a culture, are most afraid of. I don't know for sure because I absolutely refuse to watch horror movies. But I wanted to investigate this theory further, so instead of watching the horror movies currently in theaters, I just watched the trailers with the sound off. This is what I found:
Silent Hill 3D
Wendt exits 'The Odd Couple'
Oct. 30, 2012- A review of the University of Chicago's new arts building, the Logan Center, and their new cabaret series, in the Chicago Maroon, calls it "a venue for artists of all disciplines and persuasions to perform.
Malkovich's 'Confessions of a Serial Killer'
Oct. 29, 2012
- John Malkovich will be performing in The Infernal Comedy: Confessions of a Serial Killer at the Chicago Symphony Center on February 1 and 2. Tickets are now on sale. The production "is staged for a Baroque orchestra with period instruments, two sopranos and one actor. It tells the true story of Austrian serial murderer and writer Jack Unterweger (Malkovich) through chapters of spoken dialogue, each concluded with arias by Gluck, Vivaldi, Beethoven and others."
- Chicago Opera Theater is holding a subscription raffle for National Opera Week, which runs from this Monday to next.
Daily Rehearsal: Bonnie Metzgar leaves About Face
Oct. 26, 2012- TimeOut critic Oliver Sava won Chicago Theatre Off Book's prize of an entire episode dedicated to whatever theater company he wanted. Sava chose Strangetree Group, so this week's episode is all about them, with guests like Emily Schwartz, the playwright of their latest production Funeral Wedding: The Alvin Play, as well as director Jess McLeod and other members of the cast and crew.
- About Face Theatre Company's Board of Directors announced Thursday that Artistic Director Bonnie Metzgar would be leaving at the end of their 2012-13 season.