Marissa Oberlander, author at Chicago Reader

Harrison Lampert, a white male magician, stands onstage left at the Chicago Magic Lounge. He is holding a length of white rope. There are several audience members seated at cabaret tables on the right.

Absurdist sleight of hand

by Marissa Oberlander January 18, 2023January 18, 2023

For the uninitiated like I was, just entering the Chicago Magic Lounge on a chilly Wednesday evening was a thrill. Via a secret door, the faux-laundromat entry gives way to a luxe theater both steeped in history with posters of illusionists past and very much alive with a small army of close-up magicians working the […]

Nine actors onstage, performing "La Vie Boheme" in Rent. Most of them are seated in the background, but Angel, wearing a green dress and knee-high white boots, and Tom Collins, wearing dark trousers, a red T-shirt, and a camouflage jacket, are standing on chairs front and center, their fists raised.

Theater Review

Rent pays off

by Marissa Oberlander November 9, 2022November 9, 2022

After thoroughly enjoying the shameless perversity of Kokandy Productions’s Cruel Intentions, under Adrian Abel Azevedo’s direction, I found Azevedo’s Rent at Porchlight to bring a stark, often heart-wrenching dose of relevance to his now-known talent for embodying nostalgia. Musicals can be tough when you have the cast recording memorized, but this production of the late […]

Six people representing the characters in Clue are in a library set. Two Black men stand behind the couch. Three white women and a white man sit on the couch. They are all holding weapons associated with the game and the show (knife, rope, candlestick, etc.)

Theater Review

Catch the Clue bus

by Marissa Oberlander October 28, 2022October 28, 2022

The game Clue taught me what “confidential” means, that a conservatory is just a fancy greenhouse, and that Miss Scarlett is always the right choice. Any armchair detective that could identify those little toy weapons in the dark with their eyes closed will enjoy this new stage adaptation of the 1985 movie based on the […]

A woman in a dark blouse with dark hair is grapped against a wall. Another woman with short dark hair, wearing a lacy blouse with a necklace, leans in toward her in an intimidating fashion.

Theater Review

An ‘exciting and subversive” Richard III

by Marissa Oberlander September 8, 2022September 8, 2022

In partnership with the University of Illinois Chicago’s Disability Cultural Center, Babes With Blades’s interpretation of one of Shakespeare’s darkest plays is exciting and subversive. From overt to subtle, disturbing to laughable, the production empowers a cast of female and nonbinary actors, some with disabilities seen and unseen, to portray the breadth of human experience […]

Ross Johnson, an older white male in a gray suit, stands center stage. Two other older white males stand on either side of him. Johnson has his right index finger raised. There are two red chairs visible behind them.

Theater Review

Mind games

by Marissa Oberlander July 27, 2022July 27, 2022

More than 30 years into his second act as a mind reader and psychic performer, Ross Johnson, a former schoolteacher, is still eliciting gasps. The second performer at Rogers Park’s new Rhapsody Theater—formerly the Mayne Stage—the 77-year-old is like Mister Rogers meets Twilight Zone’s Rod Serling in his interactive one-man show. It’s hard to shock […]

Four young people in flowing colorful robes surround Bottom, who is playing a guitar and wearing donkey ears.

Theater Review

Al fresco dreams

by Marissa Oberlander July 20, 2022July 20, 2022

On its ten-year anniversary and return from a COVID-19 hiatus, Midsommer Flight is restaging A Midsummer Night’s Dream,the play that started it all in 2012. On the night I attended, the crowd, close to 100 people by my estimation and incredibly engaged, was compelling proof that free summer Shakespeare continues to bring communities together around […]

A woman in a black suit with a red lace teddy visible underneath crouches in a dance position center. On the left, a young woman in a school uniform leaps in the air. A young man sits on a bed behind them, while another young man jumps in the air on the right.

Theater Review

Shameless nostalgia

by Marissa Oberlander June 24, 2022July 6, 2022

We all remember where we were when we saw Cruel Intentions. Its iconic soundtrack (anyone else melt to Counting Crows’ “Colorblind”?) and “shameless perversity” (thank you, Buzzfeed, for this spot-on description) have become canon in many a millennial’s coming of age and sexual maturity. Directed by Adrian Abel Azevedo, Kokandy Productions’s Chicago storefront premiere of […]

A young white woman in a blue sleeveless dress sits while a young white man holding a microphone stands behind her. Two martini glasses are on the table before them, and a neon sign reading "cocktails" is on the wall.

Theater Review

Sex education

by Marissa Oberlander May 4, 2022June 29, 2022

The Chicago production of off-Broadway’s longest running comedy is a fun, interactive night out with some surprisingly touching, and even useful, takeaways. The 75-minute show is based on a 1997 book of the same title (by Dan Anderson and Maggie Berman), which the program reminds us was ahead of its time—before Will & Grace, Sex […]

Actor in black dress with long green scarf sings while standing in front of three actors in royal costumes in background.

Theater Review

Royal fun

by Marissa Oberlander March 24, 2022March 24, 2022

Theo Ubique’s take on this classic musical parody of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Princess and the Pea,” directed by local musical comedy pro Landree Fleming, is smart, sweet, and slickly produced. And mounting a show that prods at traditional gender roles with a first-rate, gender-blind cast results in a multilayered artistic experience that makes this […]

Black performer in white robe stands with arms outstretched and singing, with three Black singers standing behind

Theater Review

Spiritual healing

by Marissa Oberlander March 24, 2022March 24, 2022

Black Ensemble Theater’s first play back since the pandemic, an original from founder Jackie Taylor (she wrote, produced, directed, and choreographed), is exactly what the title states—an out-of-body, communal experience that creates the physical “togetherness” we’ve missed for so long. It’s an energizing and participatory homage to the Black church experience, which as the cast […]

A group of children and adults stand center stage in celebratory poses, with paper chains hung over the stage.

Theater Review

Together again at Filament

by Marissa Oberlander March 8, 2022March 8, 2022

Pronoia: the belief that the universe is conspiring in your favor. After two years away, Filament Theatre is back with an original production that brings this hopeful and expansive feeling to its audience in delightful and authentic ways. While the 60-minute Gather was written by Julia Lederer and Julie Ritchey (directed by Ritchey), the play […]

Best of Chicago

Best trajectory from ‘delightful child’ to survivalist soccer player

by Marissa Oberlander March 2, 2022March 15, 2022

Sophie Thatcher Monica Vitti. Peter Ivers. Béatrice Dalle. Esoteric influences the impossibly cool Sophie Thatcher pays tribute to on her impossibly cool Instagram account, which all have me running for Wikipedia to keep up. After her breakout turn on Showtime’s Yellowjackets, this 21-year-old product of the Chicago theater scene has literally become her generation’s Juliette […]

Woman in white pants and gray off-the-shoulder sleeveless blouse stands with one leg up on table that has a rose in a wine bottle. Man stares at rose

Theater Review

Singing for the roses

by Marissa Oberlander January 25, 2022January 25, 2022

For the longtime home of Million Dollar Quartet to have transitioned to the site of a rotating slate of parody musicals could be cringe-inducing, if not for their impressively consistent quality and ability to draw sizable audiences. It’s a feat that’s all the more notable with Omicron’s rise (and hopeful fall?) emptying chairs at live […]

Theater Review

Hothouse Shakespeare

by Marissa Oberlander December 8, 2021December 8, 2021

Midsommer Flight’s production of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night is back at the Lincoln Park Conservatory, this time with an immersive “choose-your-own-path” twist. It’s an exciting concept that could use some workshopping given the uniqueness of the greenhouse space and the inherent challenges already present in performing Shakespeare in a way that’s relatable and easy to follow […]

Two men with guitars and two women in waiter uniforms on a diner set

Theater Review

Pump Boys & Dinettes is frothy fun

by Marissa Oberlander November 10, 2021November 10, 2021

As a first-time viewer of Pump Boys & Dinettes, a nearly 40-year-old musical that showcases the depth and breadth of Black acting, musicianship, and choreography, I was surprised (though I shouldn’t have been) to learn that Porchlight Music Theatre’s racially diverse casting was the exception, not the norm. Under the direction of Black Ensemble Theater […]