With all the earmarks of a romantic comedy, First Floor Theater’s “Deer and the Lovers,” now playing at The Den Theatre, offers up of a barrel of laughs along with serious reflections threaded throughout. Written by Emily Zemba and directed by Jesse Roth, the 100-minute play dives deep into the…
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Theatre in Review
Saturday, 12 November 2016 23:38
Review: About Face's "I Am My Own Wife" at Theater Wit
Written by John Accrocco
In 2002, About Face Theater company debuted Doug Wright's play "I Am My Own Wife." It opened on Broadway in 2004, and won both the Pulitzer Prize as well as the Tony award for Best New Play. About Face Theater and director Andrew Volkoff revisit the play twelve years later…
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Theatre in Review
Wednesday, 09 November 2016 23:56
Review: Porchlight's "End of the Rainbow"
Written by John Accrocco
To say Judy Garland led a tumultuous life is an understatement. In a way, she was the mid-century equivalent of Amy Winehouse. A once brilliant, and at times triumphant star who faded out much too soon. Maybe some will only remember Judy as Dorothy Gale, but in her short career…
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Theatre in Review
Monday, 07 November 2016 23:44
The Fairy Queen Suffers From Trying Too Hard To Be Cool
Written by Michelle Reidy
The Fairy Queen is a baroque opera written by Henry Purcell in 1692 as an adaptation of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night's Dream. On November 5th, in the newly restored Studebaker Theater, the Chicago Opera Theater produced their reimagined version of the opera in collaboration with Culture Clash. The show is…
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Theatre in Review
Wednesday, 09 November 2016 22:54
Singin' in the Rain is all wet – and that’s a good thing
Written by Bill Esler
Marriott Theatre has staged an audacious, vibrant production with its adaptation of the 1952 Gene Kelley musical, ‘Singin’ in the Rain.’ This show reaches for the stars, and its company is so exuberant, its orchestration and choreography so refined, that shortcomings of the script (by legendary duo Adolph Green and…
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Theatre in Review
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Fun Home is not merely a well-crafted, excellent musical in every sense of the word but an important one. Fittingly winning the Tony award for Best Musical the same year same-sex marriage was legalized in the United States, Fun Home is the first Broadway musical to feature a lesbian protagonist.…
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Theatre in Review
"Out damned spot out..." This line tragically uttered by Lady Macbeth is probably one of the more memorable lines in Shakespeare's Macbeth and it also was one of the more memorable moments in Theatre Y's production now playing at the Chopin Theatre. The role of Lady Macbeth, played by Katie…
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Theatre in Review
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In an interview in the program, playwright Eugene Lee says that East Texas Hot Links is like a combination of an August Wilson play and the Twilight Zone. But fantasy was a common feature of Wilson’s plays. The new production of Lee’s 1991 play at Writers Theatre in Glencoe, which…
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Theatre in Review
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In tradition of the Halloween season, First Folio Theatre keeps with its ongoing classic horror theme, this time presenting the world premiere of “Dr. Seward’s Dracula” in line with past productions “Frankenstein” and “The Madness of Edgar Allan Poe”. Finely adapted by Joseph Zettelmaier and cleverly directed by Jeff Award…
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Theatre in Review
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Tuesday, 18 October 2016 22:12
The Devil Makes All of Us Do It in Hilarious Hand to God
Written by Bill Esler
Watching teens in a Cypress, Texas, Bible class plan a sock puppet revue, we have a setting ripe with dramatic possibilities. In Hand to God, playing now at Victory Gardens Theater, one of those puppet claims a mind of his own, hurling sacrilegious epithets and encouraging mayhem with his devil-may-care…
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Theatre in Review
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"Atlantic City is like a real life, 3D Bruce Springsteen song, and not one of the good ones. Something off Nebraska," controversial monologist Mike Daisey waxes in his new show "The Trump Card." Daisey, a master storyteller, made a splash in 2010 when his Apple expose "The Agony and the…
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Theatre in Review
Thursday, 13 October 2016 13:26
New Colony's "Merge" A Funny, In Depth Look at Atari History
Written by Michaelle Bradford
True gamers, especially nostalgic ones, will appreciate The New Colony’s world premiere of Merge. Closing out its 2016 season, this 90-minute, fast-paced, and often funny, performance at the Den Theatre’s Upstairs Main Stage spotlights the roller-coaster history of Atari, a pioneer manufacturer of video arcade games. Written by Spenser Davis…
Published in
Theatre in Review
Monday, 10 October 2016 13:32
The Burials Refuses to Let Our Consciences Lie Unattended
Written by Jacob Davis
If you were to take a survey of teenagers and young adults to determine which social issue they’re most interested in seeing addressed onstage, mass shootings would be near the top of the list. Though the kind of incident in which an ideologically fanatical and/or severely mentally ill individual massacres…
Published in
Theatre in Review
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