Displaying items by tag: Frankenstein

Really? Another ‘Frankenstein’? The 2018/19 season was the year of ‘Frankenstein’. To celebrate the 200th anniversary of Mary Shelley’s classic gothic thriller, four theatre companies produced wildly different adaptations of the novel. If you find yourself wondering whether these companies knew of each other’s productions, they surely did. The beauty of the Chicago theatre landscape is that there’s a lot of room for good storytelling. Lookingglass Theatre wraps up their season with a bold adaptation from the same team who brought us ‘Moby Dick’ and ‘Lookingglass Alice’.

Conceived and directed by David Catlin, this take on ‘Frankenstein’ is as visually stunning as it is insightful. The in-the-round staging makes this telling feel more active, as the entire performance space is used throughout. Shifting around in your seat feels like a more engaging way to view the show. Not knowing where the monster or the next loud sound will come from, heightens the sense of terror. Catlin’s production is scary. Many of the other productions discounted that this is a horror story originally intended by Mary Shelley to scare guests at a party.

While nearly all the productions tried to weave Mary Shelley’s personal life into the retelling, Catlin’s version cuts right to the heart. In fluid transitions between Shelley’s life and ‘Frankenstein’, we get to see the range of Cordelia Dewdney’s talents as an actress. The show may be titled after the scientist, but this is a play about Mary Shelley. Dewdney’s dialogue as Mary Shelley is heartbreaking when considering her real life. Cruz Gonzalez-Cadel also turns in a strong performance in a variety of characters, all of which she plays comically large with a faux pregnancy belly.

The balance of good casting, inventive storytelling and arresting staging distinguish this production. Catlin has chosen to frame his version almost as children playing dress up while exchanging ghost stories. And since the characters are adults, there’s a simmering sexiness to this production. Sexy and ‘Frankenstein’ are two words rarely seen in the same sentence, but somehow Lookingglass achieves just that, making this a delicious evening at the theatre. Thrills, chills and titillation, the pillars of entertainment.

Even though we are now 201 years out from the original publication of ‘Frankenstein’, don’t sleep on this striking production at Lookingglass. For those with a grey memory of the novel from high school, or only familiar with the Universal-Boris-Karloff film version, Lookingglass serves up an unforgettable night of scary fun.

*Extended through September 1st

It’s a rare treat to get to experience anything as unique as Manual Cinema’s production of ‘Frankenstein’ at Court Theatre. With several productions of ‘Frankenstein’ going on this year, one might wonder how they’re each distinguishing themselves. Manual Cinema’s original adaptation is just that, a manual cinema. Told with intricate shadow puppets on classroom overhead projectors, ‘Frankenstein’ is like spending the evening in a toy box.

In a collaboration with Court Theatre as part of their season, Manual Cinema returns to University of Chicago where they started. The company was formed in 2012 by University of Chicago faculty members and has since evolved into an internationally acclaimed performance art troupe. Manual Cinema still resides in Chicago.

This theatrical production of ‘Frankenstein’ is unlike anything you have ever seen. Drew Dir’s concept closely follows Mary Shelley’s novel and even includes an intermittent story arc about how Mary Shelley came to write ‘Frankenstein’. Unlike a traditional play, this production contains no spoken dialogue. Instead, the cast furiously dashes around the set creating a visual splendor on several overhead projectors. Though, there are scenes of more traditional acting or, pantomime, layered into the play as well. The show is projected onto a main screen but it’s nearly impossible not to sneak away glances to the corners where the visuals are being created. A live orchestra beautifully scores the play with original music composed by Kyle Vegter and Ben Kauffman.

This production is riveting. Not only are the projections and music sumptuous but the shadowy atmosphere created by Manual Cinema is haunting. The staging is set up in a way that encourages the audience to watch how the projections are created. The story is somewhat simplified but in that simplicity is an almost pop-up book version of Shelley’s classic horror story. The cinematic score propels the action and provides an emotional component to the piece. The two-hour run time seems to breeze by and you’re left not wanting the excitement to end.

‘Frankenstein’ is Manual Cinema’s sixth full length show but hopefully that means there will be plenty more. If you’re wondering which ‘Frankenstein’ to see this fall, this is the one. There is surely nothing else like it.

Through December 1st at Court Theatre. 5535 S Ellis Avenue. 773-753-4472

You may be wondering why four of the city’s most formidable houses are each mounting productions of ‘Frankenstein’ this season. You may be also asking yourself which, if any, to see. It appears that Lifeline, Remy Bumppo, Court Theatre and Lookingglass have all included unique adaptations of the sci-fi classic. More than likely it is because 2018 marks 200 years since a young Mary Shelley published her seminal work. Of course, October is a pretty great time to stage any sort of Halloween theatre, but there’s something about the production running at Remy Bummpo that doesn’t quite feel like a horror story.

From an adaptation by Nick Dear and directed by Ian Frank, Remy Bummpo brings a great deal of humanity to this stage production. Dear’s adaptation was a success when it premiered at the Royal National Theatre in London back in 2011. It went on to be live broadcast in American movie theaters in 2012. This particular script comes with fanfare. The RNT production was directed by Danny Boyle and starred a then fledgling Benedict Cumberbatch. Something interesting Ian Frank borrowed from the London staging was the interchangeable casting of the Creature and Victor, played here by Nick Sandys and Greg Matthew Anderson. The two switch roles every other night. Sandys portrayed the Creature in Tuesday night’s opening.

Dear’s swift moving script begins at the creation scene, arguably the most dynamic moment of Shelley’s source material. Not too many frills here but the device saves quite a bit of exposition, because honestly who doesn’t already know the basics of the story? For those unfamiliar with Shelley’s original text, this is where the plot might diverge from popular memory. Dear’s script maintains a great faithfulness to the novel rather than the Boris Karloff monster movie.

Sandys performance as the Creature is more tragic than scary. Though, Kristy Leigh Hall’s special effect makeup makes Sandys unrecognizable and very menacing. The Creature, like a baby, begins naked and ignorant of the world around. Over the course of the 90-minute play, we watch a cruel world educate the outcast Creature into becoming a monster bent on revenge. Sandys eventual monologues about the desire for love are as haunting as the murder scenes. The script intellectualizes the Creature in a way that makes the audience pity him instead of fear him.

Ian Frank’s production is intimate and minimal. A sleek stage design by Joe Schermoly gives this production a disorienting effect. It’s almost to say, forget what you think you know about ‘Frankenstein’. In fact, this ‘Frankenstein’ may not even be a true horror story. Unlike Stoker’s ‘Dracula’ or Gaston Leroux’s ‘Phantom of the Opera’ – ‘Frankenstein’ sets itself aside as a story of scientific failure and the condition of humans to fear what we do not understand. It’s a story about the human need for love and this production tugs at the heart more often than it curdles the blood. Mary Shelley would appreciate the depth this adaptation gives to her most important contribution to literature.

Through November 11 at Remy Bummpo. Theatre Wit 1229 W Belmont Ave. 773-975-8150

If you’ve ever wondered what may have filled in the omitted bits and fragments in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, First Folio’s “The Gravedigger” takes the mystery away while presenting its own mystery. Ingeniously creating a story within a story, “The Gravedigger” takes us to a heartbroken and devastated Dr. Victor Frankenstein who searches to destroy the monster who killed his family – a monster he breathed life into himself.

Meanwhile, as Victor hunts, the monster encounters a gravedigger, “Kurt”, when he tries to kill himself in a cemetery. Through reasoning and understanding, the gimpy gravedigger convinces the monster to live and the two develop a friendship. Kurt is dealing with his own past transgressions and we see similarities emerge between the two as the story continues. As time goes on, the monster learns to care and love because he is for the first time being accepted for who he is rather than hated and misunderstood. He even learns he has a soul despite the fact he is created form various corpse parts. When a woman, a self-proclaimed reader of the future, enters the monsters life he begins to become even more human.

Just in time for Halloween, the world premiere of “The Gravedigger” is a haunting, but heartfelt story written by Joseph Zettelmaier that keeps audience members engaged thanks to its flowing dialogue, eighteenth century costumes and memorable set that looks like a cemetery from an old horror flick. In fact, the play is held in the Mayslake Peabody Estate where rumors have its former owner Francis Peabody haunting the mansion, giving it an extra dose of creepy.

Craig Spidle is dynamic as “Kurt” and really grabs his character by the you-know-whats, anchoring a strong cast that includes Chicago acting veterans Doug MacKechnie and Simina Contras. Josh Carroll takes on the role of the monster otherwise known as “Anton” and does an admirable job as the simpleton who expresses many different feelings and emotions for the first time. At time inner beauty is so well defined and personified in Zettelmaier's characters, yet we see that sometimes we are just a vulnerable moment away from unleashing the primitive beast within ourselves. 

That horror can be intertwined with beauty and love makes this story penetrating. It is a story of hope, a story of what could be and a story of change, all the time testing human behavior.  “The Gravedigger” wins on so many levels and can be seen through November 2^nd at First Folio Theatre in Oakbrook. Joseph Zettelmaier is a young playwright to keep an eye on.

For more show information, visit www.firstfolio.org.