The long Memorial Day weekend is coming up, and many theater companies are sprinting towards the finish line of their respective seasons, so there are a lot of plays currently running on Chicago’s stages. I thought I’d be able to publish, on a semi-regular basis, the list of upcoming performances I was planning to go to, but it just hasn’t happened, since I had to first keep up with actually being able to go to the theatre with the numerous selections on view (plus my day-and-night consulting job got really busy over the past couple of weeks). For my dear blog readers clamoring for guidance on what to see next, here are some options to consider (and I’d love to hear what folks think after I post on them):
- I went to the opening night for Program A (comprised of seven new ten-minute plays) of Collaboraction’s Sketchbook festival at the Steppenwolf Garage last Saturday. I am waiting, though, until I see Program B this Thursday before I post about my overall impressions of the show (consisting of seven other new plays). I’ve gone to Sketchbook regularly over the years, first at its former home at the Chopin Theatre, and then last year at the Steppenwolf Garage, and I really, strongly feel that it is one of the must-go-to theatrical events of the late spring/early summer in Chicago. It is a fascinating, original, and when it’s good, highly combustible, mélange of theater, a nightclub, a rock concert, an art gallery opening, and a hip, up-to-the moment salon series - literate, artsy, creative, rambunctious, a little adult-ADDed. Collaboraction made some major changes this year, including heightening audience participation through Sketchbook SUBMIT, but I’ll write more about that when I give my impressions on the program as a whole.
- The one play I am highly anticipating going to over the next couple of weeks is the Hypocrites‘ production of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, which I am seeing this Saturday, directed by (and starring) one of the most highly-regarded directors in our own vibrant artistic town, David Cromer. David’s currently being showered with euphoric acclaim by our allegedly jaded theatrical brethren in New York City for his off-Broadway production of The Adding Machine, the Musical (an import from Evanston’s Next Theatre). I chatted with From the Ledge friend Kris Vire, Storefront Rebellion blogger and Timeout Chicago theater critic during the Sketchbook opening night, and he confirmed that this particular Our Town was indeed worth the raves it had been getting, as he pointed out on his blog. I can’t wait to see it - I’m hyperventilating like a thrill seeker on a pound of Kenyan dry roast about to skyjump - and I’ll be posting on the play immediately after I see it. Unfortunately all shows, including the recently added Saturday matinee performances, are sold out.
- I’m going to one of the preview performances this Sunday of Brett Neveu’s Gas for Less at the Goodman. I’m a big fan of Brett, who I have been fortunate to meet through various activities with the Red Orchid Theatre, where he is part of the ensemble, and I especially loved the intellectual challenge of Weapon of Mass Impact (staged at the Red Orchid last year) and the sharp and insightful provocations of the race drama Heritage (at the American Theater Company a couple of seasons back). I’m looking forward to seeing Gas for Less, which, from the advance press, seems to be one of two major, Chicago-based urban dramas tackling the socio-cultural challenges of development, gentrification, and urban renewal (the other one being Tracy Letts’ much anticipated new play, following the success of August: Osage County, called Superior Donuts, which will receive its world premiere at Steppenwolf Theatre during the summer). I’m so thrilled for Brett, because I really think this Goodman production will help put him on the national radar of must-see young playwrights.
- I also already have tickets for Mary-Arrchie’s production of John Patrick Shanley’s Beggars In the House of Plenty, which is slated to open right after Memorial Day. I don’t have much information on the play other than it is a semi-autobiographical take on childhood and loss, but I’ve always wanted to see a Mary-Arrchie production, since it’s one of the more highly-regarded storefront theaters in the city; plus the play will showcase some of the young Chicago actors whose performances I eagerly look out for (such as Greasy Joan & Co.’s Carlo Garcia).
- After the kick-ass Don Giovanni, which I wrote about here, and John Adam’s new opera, A Flowering Tree (which I would not be able to see), the exciting Chicago Opera Theater is staging Handel’s Orlando as a film noir/Raymond Chandler-novel-type piece. Interesting, and the theatrical possibilities are fantastic- I would never have thought of Orlando as being staged in that way. I’m seeing this opera early June, thanks to tickets I won at a benefit silent auction.
I was also at the opening night last week of A Red Orchid Theatre’s Not a Game for Boys, a British comedy-drama from the mid-1990s receiving its Chicago premiere. It’s about a trio of taxi drivers in London who play as a team in a pingpong tournament once a week. Although it contains the trademark, traffic-stopping, intense, riveting performances that A Red Orchid is known for, especially from Nigel Patterson as the team captain desperate to escape his horrible home life of co-dependent wife, senile mother, and worthless sons, the play, in my opinion, is a relic of its times. It seems like the themes it explores - of the nature of male friendship and loyalty, the definition of masculinity, the inability of men to express their feelings for other men - are quite familiar territory, done with more depth and insight elsewhere. It’s also quite slight, not at all in the vein of the provocative, shocking, outrageous, but extremely satisfying nights I’d spent at Red Orchid, the one, in my opinion, truly, fearlessly, challenging theater company in Chicago. Not a Game for Boys is still a great night at an intimate storefront theater, so if you haven’t seen a Red Orchid production, this would be a great introduction (and all of my friends who decided to ignore my theater invitations after Blasted, which I still maintain was one hell of a show, can now call me back).
Finally, not a recommendation, but a sigh of relief - the sit-down production of Wicked will be closing in January 2009 after 3 ½ years, 1,500 performances, $210 million in ticket sales, 3.5 million audience members, and a criminally-long time to hold the brilliant Rondi Reed hostage as Madame Morrible, prior to August: Osage County. Enough said - I hope the Chicago theater district actually looks to real Chicago theater for a successor.
Tags: A Red Orchid Theatre, Chicago Opera Theatre, Collaboraction Theatre, Goodman Theatre, Hypocrites Theatre
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