Chicago Lifestyle Podcast & Video Blog
Podcast episodes and video related to theater and performance art in Chicago including reviews, interviews and other information.
Music Theater Works’ 45th Season Begins with the Frank Loesser Classic, GUYS and DOLLS directed by Sasha Gerritson, Choreographed by Clayton Cross and Music Directed by Linda Madonia This season kicks off with what many believe is the “perfect musical” with every song in its …
On a macro level the primary themes of Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler are morality and propriety. On an individual level we find manipulation and despair. Hedda Gabler is the self-absorbed, only daughter of a military officer who has an overblown grandiose sense of her own importance, …
A sparsely furnished motel room dominates the stage. Along the perimeter an empty swimming pool, an imposing neon MOTEL sign, a massive telephone pole and bits of scrub grass suggest this is essentially the bottom of the barrel in the middle of nowhere somewhere at …
In this hilarious musical riff on Romeo and Juliet by Mark Saltzman directed by Bernard Rice at the Skokie Theatre, Romeo has awakened from a 400-year slumber to find his beloved Juliet long turned to dust. Instead, he finds a teenaged American tourist Bernadette Penza …
What are you willing to sacrifice to be the light in someone else’s life? This story by Chicago-based playwright Reina Hardy is partly about getting in touch with our better nature, rejecting a poor self-image, overcoming your own self-doubts and negative inner dialog and indeed …
Holidays have a unique way of punctuating our lives. Through this activity we assess alliances, trade information, and mark the passage of time. In The Long Christmas Dinner written by Thorton Wilder, presented by TUTA Theatre in Chicago we join an affluent Midwestern family, sometime …
Mike Royko was an outspoken Chicago journalist, who in the 1960s through 1990s railed against the political machine and championed the cause of the underdog with the same zeal he displayed toward his beloved Chicago Cubbies. Mitchell Bisschop’s roughly two-hour performance as Royko serves as …
An aspiring African American actress, Vera Stark (Ashayla Calvin) works as a personal maid to fading 1930s movie star Gloria Mitchell (Caitlin Jemison), once known as “America’s Little Sweetie-Pie.” The two have a close relationship and have a shared struggle to find success. However, due …
Letter writing is more akin to internal dialogue and can have a kind of naked intimacy that is difficult to achieve in the flesh. This is a smart biographical drama providing us a glimpse into the lives and thoughts of two interesting, actual people, who …
Kicking off this popular Chicago ensemble theater company’s 49th season a rather incompetent troupe of actors are expertly portrayed by a considerably expert cast, in Steppenwolf’s revival of Michael Frayn’s classic comedy “Noises Off,” directed by Anna D. Shapiro. A co-production with Geffen Playhouse. Featuring ensemble …
The Goodman Theatre reminds us that the more things change the more they remain the same in this production of the classic courtroom drama, “Inherit the Wind.”
Small town school teacher Bertram Cates is on trial for breaking a state law that prohibits the teaching of evolution.
The prosecution is aided by the bombastic self-important fundamentalist bible thumping Matthew Harrison Brady while Cates is represented by famed Chicago lawyer Henry Drummond, a clever defense attorney known for taking on difficult and controversial cases.
Lyric Opera of Chicago presents Beethoven’s message of freedom of expression in this captivating, new to Chicago, contemporary production of Fidelio. It’s interesting to see how easily this 18th Century music transforms to modern times. It’s and story of good triumphing over evil but most …