The Right Brain Project, dedicated to “lesser known pieces whether modern or classic,” shows excellent taste by debuting with Boris Vian’s rarely produced absurdist gem. In this vicious 1959 satire of bourgeois self-delusion, an upstanding family flee up one floor in their tenement whenever they hear a menacing, unidentifiable noise. Once resettled, they quickly forget […]
Tag: Vol. 34 No. 52
Issue of Sep. 22 – 28, 2005
Posted inNews & Politics
Hope for Property Tax Reform
We’d like to thank the Reader and Mr. Joravsky for covering the public budget hearings that the city holds every year [The Works, September 9]. It is a unique opportunity for the average citizen to express their opinions directly to our city government and to Mayor Daley. We appreciated the opportunity and were encouraged by […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Ruby Moon
Maybe the lonely, isolated, eccentric couple in Matt Cameron’s play about an abducted child are desperate with grief. Or maybe they’re crazy. At any rate, Cameron is so obsessed with gimmicks that neither his characters nor the audience can truly enter the dark heart of despair. David Almaral and Nancy Friedrich play all the characters, […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Only You
Timothy Mason’s 1988 bedroom farce about five eccentric young adults looking for love (and the deus ex machina who unites them) feels dated and dry. And the young performers in this debut staging by Rubicon Theatre Project never manage to reach beyond themselves to connect with the other actors–sometimes it feels as if they’re performing […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Aloft Aerial Dance
Somehow I had the impression that aerial dance was all about the feats. Boy, was I wrong. In an hour-long piece called Rolling Blackouts, choreographer-director Shayna Swanson takes a somewhat ragtag group of 12 performers and molds their vignettes on rings, trapezes, silks, and bungee cords into a meditation on the perils and pleasures of […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Savage Judgment
After perusing the Dan Savage column, in which he seems to fancy himself as the Ann Landers for those folks engaged in perverse sexual lifestyles, I can only reach the following conclusion: I would hate to be Dan Savage on Judgment Day when he is asked, “How could you have cast a benign eye on […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Paper Work
Jae Ko’s 22 bold abstract sculptures at Andrew Bae, made of long rolls of adding-machine tape soaked in water and ink, have their origins in a seven-year depression. After getting art degrees in Korea and Japan, Ko moved to Washington, D.C., in 1988; she married a Korean-American in 1990. She’d been raised in an unusual […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Rhinoceros Theater Festival
This annual showcase of experimental theater, performance, and music runs through 10/31 at Prop Thtr, 3502-4 N. Elston. Rhino Fest is coordinated by the Curious Theatre Branch and features emerging and established artists from Chicago’s fringe. Performances take place in Prop’s north or south theaters. Admission for most shows is $15 or “pay what you […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Alphabet Report
Word-drunk writer-performer Barrie Cole is incapable of using language straightforwardly. Even when she’s rattling off her lists of tangential associations with letters of the alphabet–the show’s opening gambits for her and fellow performer Julie Caffey–Cole’s eccentric lists are dizzying. Caffey alternately grounds Cole when she gets too out there and ventures into outer space herself […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Disgruntled Employee Handbook: A Musical
Like most workplace send-ups, this one by Second City Theatricals is hilarious if it doesn’t hit too close to home. The revue chronicles a new kid’s speedy rise to CEO. But instead of dodging bullets from vindictive execs, this young climber has to sidestep broken office equipment and steamy piles of political incorrectness. Some material […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Spectacle ’05: Loves Me . . . Loves Me Not
Redmoon Theater’s late-summer spectacle, set this year on the Jackson Park lagoon, is beautiful, ambitious, and well-intentioned. At least I think it’s well-intentioned–it’s hard to say. There’s a lot of motoring and paddling on- and offstage with little clear sense of why. True, the production had to be rethought because of the horrors wrought by […]
Posted inColumns & Opinion
Savage Love
I’m a 21-year-old straight guy with a boring, straight sex life. Until a few months ago, when something terrifying happened. Back in May I was contacted by somebody through Match.com. She claimed to be a grad student at my school and had a very attractive photo, and we began IMing. She talked about how she […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Too Dirty for Lincoln Park
Mus wrestling, cross-dressing, airborne pudding, and other wholesome fun. Plus: the world of sample sales.
Posted inArts & Culture
Galileo
Without epic theatricality, Brecht’s emblematic plays can shrink to facile morality lessons. Director Christopher J. Berens reduces Brecht’s 1947 quasi-Marxist retooling of Galileo’s life–a brash, sweeping saga depicting his headstrong struggle to publish scripture-defying scientific discoveries despite threats from the Inquisition–to a measured chamber drama. Brecht created a morally ambiguous title character, part genius, part […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Ed Thigpen’s Midwest Serengeti Quintet
The understandable hoopla surrounding the 80th birthday of drummer Roy Haynes has obscured another milestone: this December Chicago-born drummer Ed Thigpen turns 75. Thigpen’s likely the better known of the two–at least if you consider sales of albums by the Oscar Peterson Trio, which Thigpen anchored from 1959 to 1965. He’s a strong composer and […]