The return of Chicago theater (theater everywhere, really) since the pandemic continues to be a white-knuckle experience for many companies. Last Friday, 35-year-old Lookingglass Theatre (winner of the 2011 Tony Award for best regional theater) announced that they were putting all programming on pause until at least spring 2024 and cutting their staff by over […]
Tag: Raven Theatre
A refreshing October Storm
Expertly written, exquisitely performed, steamy, and hilarious, The October Storm at the Raven Theatre offers a warm slice of south-side Chicago life in the 1960s. Joshua Allen’s play, the second in his Grand Boulevard Trilogy (the first was The Last Pair of Earlies, produced by Raven in 2021) is refreshing in that it explores the […]
Right To Be Forgotten questions how much the Internet should remember
Producing a commentary on the Internet is typically an exercise in redundancy, tasked with avoiding tropes beaten into media by shows like Black Mirror or 13 Reasons Why. At this point, we clearly understand that we live inseparably from our digital footprints as we inadvertently document our own legacies. Despite the risk of redundancy, the […]
Sexy screwball comedy with a twist
“Extraordinary,” muses Amanda, the heroine of Noël Coward’s Private Lives, “how potent cheap music is.” Her rueful observation, uttered while she is standing on the terrace of a hotel where she is staying, is in reference to a song playing in the ballroom below. The melody is described in Coward’s script as “a sentimental, romantic […]
Chinatown hip-hop, Summer Skate, Dracula, and dance
Have you hit a summer festival in Chinatown yet? Starting today through Sunday, Hip Hop in Chinatown is happening at Chinatown Square (2133 S. China Pl.), a three-day festival celebrating Chicago hip-hop while subtly intimating the relationship of immigrant communities to music, fashion, and street culture. From 2-9 PM today, there will be a street […]
People who need people
When everyone on the stage is excellent, it shows a director fully in command of the material. That’s the case with Cody Estle’s production of The Luckiest by Melissa Ross, receiving its Chicago premiere at the Raven Theatre. Plays about a young woman’s disability and impending death always risk straying into Love Story-style bathos, while […]
The chill of other suns
Before it was retrofitted into an upscale wedding and corporate events hall, the landmark Motor Row building at 2400 South Michigan was home to the Chicago Defender, the iconic Black newspaper of record that in no small part empowered and facilitated the Great Migration of Black southerners to northern cities during the early 20th century. […]
A tsunami of news and a new path for Actors’ Equity membership
Changes in faces, places, and union rules might carry harbingers of a shifting landscape in Chicago theater.
ComedySportz moves out of its Belmont Avenue venue
But the comedy games continue online; plus Raven announces a new-play development commission.
Ghost Light: a roundup of offstage performing arts news and notes
Victory Gardens and Raven name new leadership; J. Nicole Brooks wins a prestigious playwriting grant.
A new adaptation brings contemporary verve to A Doll’s House
Two standout performances anchor Raven’s production of the Ibsen classic.
Cold Town/Hotline can’t overcome its preposterous premise
Eli Newell’s self-directed holiday play at Raven asks us to suspend too much disbelief.
In search of a happier ending
Raven Theatre has wiped its founders from its history.
Magic and music combine in the Memphis-set Hoodoo Love
Katori Hall’s play takes its time but weaves a spell.
Sundown, Yellow Moon does best in quiet shadows
Raven’s production has heart, but doesn’t fully connect the pieces.