This is the first time we’ve done a summer theater and arts issue, and judging by the full-to-bursting content, that’s surprising—especially given how much Chicagoans love getting outdoors in the summer. You can read about some theater and dance programs that specialize in bringing performances to public parks, or, if you prefer indoor immersive experiences, […]
Tag: Summer Arts 2022
Summer Theater & Arts Preview
Articles
Browse the full June 23, 2022 issue. Download a free PDF of the print issue.
Posted inCity Life
House music, Midsummer parties, and Queer Pride
Here’s some events and activities to close out the month of June and start the summer right.
Posted inArts & Culture
Method and madness
“My dear boy, why don’t you try acting?” Laurence Olivier’s quippy response to Dustin Hoffman’s story of how he stayed up three nights to fully inhabit the sleepless state of his character in the 1976 thriller Marathon Man may be the most oft-cited example of the absurd ends Method acting came to in America. But […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Siah Berlatsky shakes up Shakespeare
Siah Berlatsky just graduated this month from ChiArts, but though she’s taking a gap year before college, the 18-year-old playwright-director-actor isn’t letting the grass grow under her feet. In August, she’ll be part of Artistic Home’s outdoor developmental series, “Summer on the Patio,” with her Elizabethan-style gender-bending rom-com, Malapert Love, which she also directs. (“Malapert,” […]
Posted inArts & Culture
What Cézanne saw
“Cézanne, he’s the greatest of us all.”—Claude Monet to Georges Clemenceau in conversation, cited in translation in The Paintings of Paul Cézanne: A Catalogue Raisonné (trans. John Rewald, Abrams, 1996). There are some entities and influences on our work that we take for granted, as though they were always there and it’s impossible to conceive […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Taking the drama and dance outdoors
I spent most of the 90s in the Bay Area, where outdoor theater in the summer is a given, and the weather generally cooperates (if you’re not facing the threat of forest fires, that is). But in Chicago, extreme heat and thunderstorms go with the territory. Despite Mother Nature and other logistical challenges, outdoor theater […]
Posted inFilm
Showcasing Black actors in foreign cinema
Floyd Webb is the curator of the Black Actors in Foreign Cinema screening series, co-presented by nonprofit media arts organization Chicago Filmmakers and his company, the Blacknuss Network.
Posted inFilm
Ghost of drive-ins past?
From the comfort of your car or on a picnic with friends, Chicago’s outdoor movie screenings have resuscitated the alluring drive-in experience, so screentime can be spent with others all summer long.
Posted inArts & Culture
Prince of the Mag Mile
“Prince: the Immersive Experience” begins with purple light through stained glass. Guests in groups of ten to 15 are led through double doors to a replica of the “When Doves Cry” music video set: portraits hung on purple walls, bouquets scattered on the floor, and a white claw-foot tub to pose behind. The only thing […]
Posted inArts & Culture
A Black perspective on the French Revolution
Sometimes to understand the present, we must look at the past. In 2017, playwright Terry Guest grappled with how America could elect someone so outwardly racist as Donald Trump. It shocked him into questioning what could be done about the rise of fascism in the U.S. “Do we protest? Does that work?” Guest asked himself. […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Irregular Girl is leading the fight for trans utopia
If it’s the first Friday of the month, you’re going to see a line snaking out of Berlin that extends past the entrance to the Belmont CTA station and sometimes around the block. It’s populated by people in leather miniskirts and mesh crop tops, disco bambis and alien centaurs, club mystics with lashes so long […]
Posted inArts & Culture
An invitation to listen to survivors
“It’s an invitation,” says Aaron Hughes, cocurator of “Remaking the Exceptional: Tea, Torture, and Reparations,” an exhibition currently on display at the DePaul Art Museum. Marking the 20th anniversary of the opening of the Guantánamo Bay detention camp, the exhibit examines the similarities between survivors of torture at the U.S. military prison with survivors of […]
Posted inPerforming Arts Feature
Hot weather, hot shows
Summer is officially here, in case the sweat and lightning bugs weren’t enough of a clue. In addition to the shows and artists we profiled in our summer arts preview issue this week, we’ve got just a few suggestions for other offerings in theater, dance, and opera that look promising—whether you’re looking for a nice […]