Amber Washington Archives - Chicago Reader

Four people are shown seated around a round wooden table. At lower left is a middle-aged man with dark hair, wearing a white shirt and brown sweater vest. At upper left is a younger woman with dark hair, wearing a green school uniform. At upper right is a middle-aged woman in a gray sweater, wearing a cross necklace. At lower right is another young woman with dark braided hair, wearing a top with black-and-white vertical stripes. White bowls with spoons are in front of each of them, and a black stewpot is in the center of the table.

Sisters in arms

by Kerry Reid March 10, 2023March 11, 2023

When it comes to Factory Theater, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Shannon O’Neill’s play The Kelly Girls, about two sisters in Northern Ireland, would be close in tone and spirit to the endearing Northern Irish comedy series Derry Girls. After all, Factory has been providing high-spirited pastiches/parodies that both satirize and celebrate the best […]

A white woman playing Marie Antoinette is in her underthings and stockings, being dressed and fussed over by three Black servants.

Theater Review

You say you want a revolution?

by Kerry Reid July 6, 2022July 14, 2022

On one wall of the set for Terry Guest’s Marie Antoinette and the Magical Negroes, now in a local premiere with Story Theatre under Guest’s direction, a large sign tells us “THIS IS NOT HISTORY.” True: what Guest’s skillfully rendered sardonic political comedy offers is a funhouse view (with not always so much fun, given […]