On the wall of the big-box retail warehouse that forms the setting for Eboni Booth’s Paris, now in a midwest premiere at Steep Theatre under Jonathan Berry’s direction, there’s a sign reading: NOBODY CARES. WORK HARDER. It’s a stark enunciation of the realities of late-stage capitalism and consumerism. Paris Through 7/23: Thu-Sat 7:30 PM, Sun […]
Tag: Jonathan Berry
Posted inTheater Review
Evergreen grief
When my mother was nearing the end of her battle with stage four cancer, she opened Google on the family computer one day, keyed in “assisted suicide,” and hit search. Scared, selfish, and in my early 20s, I pretended to have never stumbled across the phrase in the browser history and tried to keep it […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Lindiwe is at its best when it lets the music do the talking
Steppenwolf’s latest collaboration with Ladysmith Black Mambazo has too much story, not enough song.
Posted inArts & Culture
The Children vividly imagines the worst-case scenario after an environmental disaster.
Playwright Lucy Kirkwood’s devastated world is nightmarishly familiar.
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In Red Rex, Ike Holter’s Chicago Cycle gets meta
A play about a storefront theater playing in a storefront theater
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The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time bloats up on its journey to the stage
But patient audiences will find something to like in Steppenwolf for Young Adults’s new production.
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In The Harvest, Samuel D. Hunter suggests that even fundamentalists are human
The play defeats expectations and shakes its audience up.
Posted inArts & Culture
You Got Older doesn’t try for wiser
Clare Barron’s autobiographical play is the dramatic equivalent of a foodie Instagram.
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Choir Boy, Foxfinder, and 12 more stage shows to see now
A play by Moonlight author Tarell Alvin McCraney and a paranoiac drama by British playwright Dawn Hall are among this week’s best bets.
Posted inArts & Culture
Wit, Earthquakes in London, and six more new theater reviews
The Hypocrites’ staging of a Pulitzer Prize winner and a U.S. premiere at Steep are among this week’s best bets.
Posted inArts & Culture
Winterset, Finding Neverland, and three more alternatives to holiday fare
A resonant period piece and a musical that does it better than the movie are among this week’s best bets.
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At Profiles Theatre the drama—and abuse—is real
For more than 20 years, actors and crew members stayed silent about mistreatment they suffered at the acclaimed storefront theater. Now they’re speaking up, hoping to protect workers in non-Equity theaters across the country.
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Steppenwolf’s Constellations and Voice Lessons, and 13 more new stage shows
An endless meet-cute and an off-key farce are among this week’s notables.
Posted inArts & Culture
Little Shop of Horrors, Death of a Streetcar Named Virginia Woolf, and ten more new stage shows
A monstrous revival and a collaboration between Writers Theatre and Second City are among this week’s theater and performance best bets.
Posted inArts & Culture
The Hypocrites’ Adding Machine, Factory’s The Last Big Mistake, and eight more stage shows to see now
Ten new reviews of notable stage shows, among them a musical based on Elmer Rice’s expressionist 1923 satire.