Barbara Lhota’s new play raises questions it can’t answer.
Author Archives: Irene Hsiao
Posted inArts & Culture
The teens at the Albany Park Theater Project have crafted a beautiful Ofrenda
It’s a powerful example of theater as activism.
Posted inArts & Culture
In CDC in 4-D, the Comedy Dance Collective indulges its oral fixation
It’s a show better consumed in a state of inebriation.
Posted inArts & Culture
Zephyr Dance’s new venue Site/Less makes its debut with a performance filled with potent images
Michelle Kranicke and company thread their way through Shadows Across Our Eyes.
Posted inArts & Culture
Ghosts of War narrates more than it represents
This adaptation of an Iraq war memoir by a “GI Joe Schmoe” is strangely lifeless.
Posted inArts & Culture
Cornerstone immerses audiences in a weekend seminar that will change their lives—maybe
But is it self-help, a cult, or a multi-level marketing scheme?
Posted inArts & Culture
Lie Through My Skin attempts to confront the shame of white privilege
It’s too bad you can’t really tell.
Posted inArts & Culture
The Wolves starts strong—then chokes on too many sports movie cliches
Sarah DeLappe’s Pulitzer-nominated play isn’t the landmark of feminist theater it could be.
Posted inBlogs
The best and rest of Rhinofest
The Reader critics’ guide to the annual fringe festival
Posted inArts & Culture
The Joffrey’s Modern Masters could—and should—do better
A mixed bill shows off contemporary ballet’s ills.
Posted inBlogs
Catalyst Movmnt showcases the experiences of black womyn through dances of their own making
Three recent Columbia College grads bring a program of socially engaged works to Links Hall.
Posted inDance
Joffrey’s lavish but ‘overpressured’ Nutcracker returns
The Joffrey’s 2016, $4 million commissioned production of Christopher Wheeldon’s Nutcracker returns to the Auditorium for another season. As spectacle, there is surely no more lavish rendition of the holiday classic. Set in Chicago around the time of the Columbian Exposition, the production includes Polish folk dances to a thinned-out, brassier arrangement of Tchaikovsky’s score in Act […]
Posted inBlogs
Ayako Kato’s three-month movement workshop Art of Now III culminates with an experimental performance concert
Facilitator Ayako Kato says she started her workshop to “offer an opportunity to overcome loneliness.”
Posted inBlogs
Welcome to the world of the Seldoms’ The Making
The exploration that began with Power Goes and RockCitizen continues with a multimedia triptych set in Pulaski Park Field House.
Posted inArts & Culture
Molly Shanahan speaks from the gut in Blackbird’s Ventriloquy
The dancer-choreographer’s latest solo work is fraught with duality.