Posted inArts & Culture

Steeped in history

In the most famous lines of his 1855 poem “Song of Myself,” Walt Whitman writes, “Do I contradict myself? / Very well then I contradict myself, / (I am large, I contain multitudes.)” After reading S. L. Wisenberg’s insightful new book, The Wandering Womb: Essays in Search of Home, it’s clear that she, too, contains […]

Posted inTheater Review

Fire sale

What does material success look like to young people in 2023? Is it possible to attain the lifestyle they see in 80s TV shows? Is that something to aspire to? A talented Neo-Futurist troupe takes on capitalism, parents’ expectations, their own hopes and dreams, and whether it’s even possible to just get by in this […]

Posted inTheater Review

The pain of history

I cannot recommend this play without caveats. At least to Black people.  Now, don’t get me wrong, it’s not a bad play. As a matter of fact, it’s a very good play. It’s clever, well-written, timely, and it makes good use of unusual devices. The quality of the play is not the problem.  The problem […]

Posted inTheater Review

Interactive inclusivity

Filament Theatre’s Think Fast, Jordan Chase!, written by Sonia Goldberg and directed by Jamal Howard, is full of plot twists which weave in and out of schoolyard and fantasy. Addressing difficult social scenarios that kids encounter, it opens with a plucky Jordan (Christabel Donkor) and her majestic bestie Mahari (Joolz Stroop) on the playground. Relations […]

Posted inTheater Review

Beckettian summit

Dame Peggy Ashcroft considered the role of Winnie in Samuel Beckett’s notoriously difficult Happy Days a “summit part,” one of those roles, like Hamlet or King Lear, that tests an actor’s mettle and proves her alpha status in the pack. (Ashcroft played Winnie in a 1975 production at the Old Vic Theatre in London.) Chicago […]

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Utopia for two

Promethean Theatre’s world premiere of local playwright Trina Kakacek’s two-act dramedy, directed by Anna C. Bahow, is a unique and meaty thought experiment that would benefit from some cleanup and a tighter approach. Between Ida (a winning and scene-stealing Cameron Feagin) and Vivian (Kali Skatchke)—the lone inhabitants of Progress, Ida’s vision of matriarchal utopia rooted […]

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Bed to crime to bed

Directors have two jobs: to help the audience understand what the play is about and to stage it so the audience can see it. Director Fred Anzevino has failed at both here. The Threepenny Opera is, like most Bertolt Brecht works, a critique of respectability: its antihero Macheath is a charming criminal, while its villains […]

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Woven tales

Hajja Souad’s story, eight decades of life lived, is woven into a narrative of resilience, hope, and the changing tides in Palestine during her long lifetime. Brought to life in the U.S. premiere of The Shroud Maker at Chicago Dramatists by International Voices Project in collaboration with Intercultural Music, Ahmed Masoud’s play about a burial […]

Posted inArts & Culture

So you think you know dance

The Chicago Cultural Center knows how to provide visceral and engaging Chicago-created content. Last year the city celebrated the Year of Chicago Dance, which highlighted our thriving and diverse dance community. During that time, the Chicago Cultural Center Dance Studio installed a new dance floor and provided space, time, and funding for Chicago dancemakers to […]

Posted inArts & Culture

Building COMMON ground

During the second iteration of COMMON canvas, bodies circled around a center point: a pile of clothes in an upstage corner. For a moment, the pile of clothes moved, as if to take a breath, and the bodies around it held still. The performance, which Chicago dance artist and current Hubbard Street member Alysia L. […]