Chicago

CONSCIENCE KEEPING IN A CRACKLING PLOT Taut, true and richly wrought, this 1945 potboiler by unashamed socialist playwright J.B. Priestley remains, three generations later, a clarion call to a new century. Juicy with relentless revelations about a patrician clan who rule provincial Brumley, England, it’s just as much a wake-up call for social responsibility and…

JOFFREY’S JOYOUS JEWEL Now in its 26th annual presentation, the late Robert Joffrey’s evergreen staging of Peter IlyichTchaikovsky’s beloved Christmas ballet blesses both the Auditorium Theatre and the dance pilgrims who flock to it, eager to be astonished. Still sumptuous with Oliver Smith’s lavish and fast-paced scenery, based on the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo’s…

A GAY CHRISTMAS ALL OVER CHICAGOLAND In a major first, the Chicago Gay Men’s Chorus just performed its Christmas concert at the prestigious Harris Theatre at Millennium Park in downtown Chicago. You can’t get more visible or prominent than this’”and it ain’t over yet. Today the CGMC moves to the ‘burbs to sing at the…

SOME SOULS THWART SAVING We Three Lizas, last year’s in-your-face gay holiday hit, is back with a purportedly new book and an expanded score. Relocated from the Steppenwolf Garage to Stage 773 (where the inferior acoustics of this unmiked show take their toll), it’s as iridescent as a migraine and unstoppably funky. Doggedly insistent on…

TO KNOW, KNOW, KNOW HER: Singer, comedienne and anti-glam diva Sandra Bernhard thrives on delightfully toying with her adoring throngs. I remember the first time I saw her on the David Letterman show when she snarled into the mic: “It’s that time of the month again.” When the audience responded with nervous titters, she nailed…

BURNING THE YULE LOG AT BOTH ENDS Striking a comfortable balance between sticky and sentimental, schmaltz and cynicism, five short plays by as many Chicago writers (and directed by another skilled quintet) combine to create the rightly named HoliDaze. Happily, none of these furtive glimpses of the holiday season’s well-chronicled underside, most set on Christmas…

FRANKINCENSE, MYRRH AND A FEW LUMPS OF COAL Exchanging gifts with relatives you don’t know well is always a bit disappointing. Sometimes that aunt or cousin will give you something you really want, but most of the time you’ll find yourself with clothes that aren’t quite your style or size, or a gift card to…

A CATTY YULETIDE LAUGH RIOT Following the well-earned 15-year run of Rudolph the Red-Hosed Reindeer, Hell in a Handbag Productions replaces it with a worthy winner. David Cerda’s wicked holiday musical Christmas Dearest  is equally destined for Yuletide glory. This alternately crude and clever caricature, a raucous rouser, combines Cerda’s signature icon/diva/screen goddess/rotten mother Joan Crawford…

A CHORUS FE-LINE A prolific author and auteur, Rainer Werner Fassbinder exulted in display of the seamy and hypocritical side of the post-war German bourgeoisie. He directed forty films, wrote twenty-four plays and performed thirty-six roles before his death at age thirty-seven.   His frenetic pace of production is echoed by the structure of his play,…

ASHES TO THEATER Now moving from Andersonville to Lakeview, the best production of 2011 is back to rival any currently playing: No longer sprawling the width of the Neo Futurarium’s stretched-out stage, The Ruffians’ superb, 100-minute Burning Bluebeard is concentrated in Theater Wit’s proscenium space. Its glorious, dream-like make-believe and contagious magic realism feel even…

LEGENDS OF THE HOMELESS As the title suggests, Naomi Iizuka’s uncompromising drama exposes snapshots of the urban underbelly. It focuses, so to speak, on homeless kids, prostitutes and hustlers, and the occasional Greek hero or god, such as Orpheus and Eurydice, who wander very plausibly into their midst. As recorded by the playwright 16 years…

FOR THE RECORD With only a matinee remaining today, it’s soon to be history, but this River North Dance Chicago is offering some stunning steps at the Harris Theater in their annual fall engagement, which includes two world premieres. The first, Get Out The Ghost, with choreography by Ashley Roland, delivers a seemingly chaotic tapestry…

A NEST OF VIPERS Don’t stop the presses. Yet another blatant spin-off (if not rip-off) of August: Osage County has splattered on the boards. What the world needs beyond peace and prosperity, it seems, is one more dysfunctional drama about a dysfunctional family. (Which is more defective, you may well wonder?) Unsolicited but eager to…

SNUFFING OUT SNOBBERY Preferring acting over setting, Gale Childs Daly’s joyously theatrical adaptation of Charles Dickens’ coming-of-age masterpiece uses six actors to play almost 40 characters. Only swift costume changes, vocal alterations and revolving set pieces confirm the variety of this sprawling novel. In 130 minutes, Strawdog Theatre’s swift-moving (and sometimes too rapid-fire)  Great Expectations traces…

GONE BUT NEVER SILENT Commemorating the 75th anniversary of “Kristallnacht,” the terrible nights of November 9-10, 1938 when Nazi thugs unleashed their most public assault on Jewish life and lives, this 70-minute one-act by Ron Hirsen creates an “elegy” from an unclaimed legacy. Earnestly staged by Victory Gardens founder Dennis Zacek in a sometimes insecure…

THE SPECIFIC ENIGMA OF A BUNNY A play is generally defined as “a staged representation of a story – see: DRAMA.” A circle ensues, because drama is explained to be “a piece of writing that tells a story and is performed on a stage.” Nassim Soleimanpour’s White Rabbit, Red Rabbit meets these basic standards –…

COMPASSION PLAY Forgetting the ineptitude of Larry Kramer’s 1988 farce Just Say No, it’s ripe to revive his 1985 masterwork about how a health crisis defined the gay community–as much by what it didn’t do as how it rose to the occasion. Unlike Just Say No ‘s driven attack on Nancy Reagan and the abstinence…

FORMULAIC IN A GOOD WAY In The Book of Mormon, Trey Parker and Matt Stone proved that subject matter in musical theatre is a lot less important than sticking to the structural formula. There’s the ensemble intro that sets the scene, the romantic duet, the protagonist’s transformative moment and the final song that ties everything…

FAST, FURIOUS AND FUNKY Ending tonight at the Harris Theatre, the latest balletic blast from the newly renamed Giordano Dance Chicago delivers six hyper-kinetic pieces. This generous outpouring fully showcase the young ensemble’s dexterity, volatitility and, well, flash-dancing. Including world premieres by an Israeli-born and Philadelphia-based choreographer and an in-house artist, the recital offers a…