Chicago

GROUNDING GENIUS IN LIFE Lucas Hnath is a curious writer who likes to pit truth against fantasy to see which captures the most actuality. His Isaac’s Eye, now in an enthralling Midwest premiere at Writers Theatre, plays fast and loose with the facts behind two seminal 17th century scientists, Robert Hooke and Isaac Newton (what…

PRAY FOR MIRACLES The “fall” in the title doesn’t mean the season. Miracles in the Fall refers to the expulsion from Paradise, the epic fall that supposedly created original sin. Pursuing the hope of redemption, Chuck O’Connor’s flawed 100-minute new work puts forgiveness over judgment as it depicts a fractured family trying to fix their…

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL, MY DEAR WATSON A cardinal rule gets broken here: You can be funny or you can be scary–but try to be both and you’re neither. You’ll be this show. Deft at farce in Lend Me a Tenor, inept at plotting in Moon Over Buffalo, apt at gags in Crazy for You, Ken Ludwig…

DUEL NATURE In Trevor, recently produced by A Red Orchid Theatre, playwright Nick Jones delivered a sardonic and heavy-handed attack on dangerous animals kept as domestic pets. He wastes no more subtlety on Stage Left Theatre’s suitably stylized Midwest premiere of his 2010 offering The Coward. Set in 1790, this precious and overly insistent two-hour…

REASONS TO BE CRITICAL Neil LaBute seems to have a penchant for ironic titles. His 2002 play The Mercy Seat was anything but merciful; LaBute described it as a “kind of emotional terrorism.” His newest play, Reasons to Be Happy (2013), concerns two pairs of best friends who are both sleeping with each other’s exes….

YOU CAN NEVER GO HOME’”AGAIN Chaim Potok’s 1972 novel My Name is Asher Lev is a coming-of-age story that pits one passion against another. It depicts the declaration of independence by a young Jewish artist from his rigid Hasidic childhood and a family where obedience is prized over self-expression. Aaron Posner’s successful, 90-minute stage adaptation,…

A POWERFUL PLAY EVEN WITH A PLOT AS POINTLESS AS ITS PEOPLE With Ecstasy, now being revived at A Red Orchid Theatre, a new Chicago theater succeeds at first: Cole Theatre Company establishes its roots in realism with a play that’s older than most of the actors. Made famous in 1997 by Roadworks Productions’ trenchant…

THIS SHOW’S ON FIRE “Ich bin ein Biedermann” isn’t what President Kennedy famously said in Berlin in 1963, but it’s something playwright Max Frisch might have said while writing Herr Biedermann und die Brandstifter in 1958. Now translated as The Arsonists in Alistair  Beaton’s 2007 version, Frisch’s comedy explores the complex interplay between perception and reality….

BREAKING BETTER He who laughs last laughs best’”especially when you overcome an addiction to methamphetamine. So, after recovery, what do you do next? (And I don’t mean Disneyland.) You turn pain into gain. You write and act out Methtacular!, a strategically comic postcard from the edge. In a manic, memorable 90 minutes, thirtysomething Steven Strafford…

THE SEAGULL AS AN ALBATROSS At over two hours, it’s almost as long as its source. So it’s a good thing that Stupid Fucking Bird is more than a parody or it would soon lose its welcome. Aaron Posner’s reductionist, presentational semi-musical and meta-theatrical updating of Chekhov’s The Seagull, a drama where one generation frustrates…

THE GREAT GAY IMPROVISERS You could call it an action meditation on marriage. As if to sum up his own theatrical legacy, as well as 70 years of gay life and love, Terrence McNally’s valedictory drama Some Men is a collage that merrily defies chronology. The reason: To prevent us from confusing the challenges of…

A TRAGEDY OF EPIC PROPORTIONS Writing a play of more than 800 pages that takes twelve hours to perform is both an act of hubris and an act of genius. Written and directed by The Hypocrites’ founder Sean Graney, All Our Tragic distills all 32 surviving Greek tragedies into one nearly seamless narrative. The result…

A REVIVAL WHICH ISN’T FIDDLING AROUND “To Life” indeed. There’s a ton of it, not to mention heartbreak and wisdom, in Rudy Hogenmiller’s warmly wise revival, Light Opera Works’ second coming in 11 years. The universality of this nearly flawless, 50-year-old musical comes from its spontaneous specifics, the story of a scripture-citing, God-fearless milkman who’s…

A JEWEL OF THEIR SOULS The Gift Theatre’s production of Othello – their first Shakespeare, and my first exposure to this company – is a gift indeed. The doubly minimal set, combined with the decision to frequently execute the Elizabethan script with contemporary vernacular rhythms, serves to rid the production of any period distractions and…

THE  OTHER  DREAMGIRLS Black Ensemble Theater’s latest summer-long tribute is to a girls group who never quite achieved escape velocity to lasting fame. Reginald Williams’ faithful chronicle of the rise and fall of the marvelous Marvelettes is a happy excuse to revisit a jukebox full of sassy songs, perfectly reinvented by director Rueben D. Echoles. It also…

SAMUEL BECKETT: MINIMALISM IN EXTREMIS Dark doings on a claustrophobic stage. These are the 80+ minutes at Mary-Arrchie Theatre’s Angel Island. Six short but not sweet offerings by the late Samuel Beckett create their own Hellish Half-Light. Audience members are scattered about the appropriately minimalist playground, a stark home for Jennifer Markowitz’ awesomely disciplined and…

IT’S NOT JUST THE MEAT, IT’S THE MISERY The final searing image in Oracle Theatre’s pile-driving retelling of Upton Sinclair’s muckraking masterwork is a bold take on the Chicago flag: Now the blue stripes flank not four stars but four bloody handprints. The vandalism happens just after the magnificent ten-member ensemble have erupted in a…