Here’s the press release from Steppenwolf:

Steppenwolf Theatre Company Announces
2010-2011 Subscription Season

CHICAGO (March 10, 2010) – Steppenwolf Theatre Company is pleased to announce its 2010-2011 Subscription Season, exploring the theme of public/private self.  Season subscriptions go on-sale to the public on Wednesday, March 10 at 11 a.m.

Detroit
a new play by Lisa D’Amour
featuring ensemble members Kate Arrington and Robert Breuler

Edward Albee’s
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
directed by Pam MacKinnon
featuring ensemble members Tracy Letts and Amy Morton

Sex with Strangers
by Laura Eason, directed by associate artist Jessica Thebus
featuring ensemble member Sally Murphy with Stephen Louis Grush

The Hot L Baltimore
by Lanford Wilson, directed by ensemble member Tina Landau
featuring ensemble members Alana Arenas, K. Todd Freeman and Yasen Peyankov

Middletown
a new play by Will Eno, directed by Les Waters
featuring ensemble member Alana Arenas Read the rest of this entry »

Photo: Dan Merlo

By Sharon Hoyer

Carrie Hanson has built a reputation for making location-conscious dances. Her works created for The Seldoms—most famously “GIANT FIX,” performed in a waterless swimming pool—are constructed very much within their environs; place is as integral a facet of the performance as music and costuming. No surprise then that the impetus for her newest work, a collaborative effort with visual artist Fraser Taylor, percussionist Tim Daisy and costume designer Lara Miller, was an inquiry into boundarylands, or the spaces between spaces. “Marchland,” playing this weekend at the estimable MCA Stage, is a departure of sorts for Hanson—at least in terms of locale. The minimalist room provides a sparse, formal canvas for Hanson to create her middle space. The Seldoms are the only Chicago-based dance company on the MCA program in recent memory, an impressive nod to Hanson’s work.

“Oh, it’s dreamy,” Hanson says of performing at the MCA. Read the rest of this entry »

Photo: Jack Vartoogian

In 1952, ballet dancer and choreographer Amalia Hernandez founded a small company dedicated to collecting and presenting traditional dances from across Mexico. Now, more than fifty years later, the Ballet Folklorico de Mexico de Amalia Hernandez has more than quadrupled its ranks and amassed a remarkable catalog of indigenous Mexican ceremonial, spiritual and celebratory folk dances, each awash in color and bursting with energy. In this, the centennial year of the Mexican revolution and bicentennial year of Mexican independence, the Ballet Folklorico is touring the U.S. with a special celebratory performance; voluminous dresses will swirl, Cuban heels will stomp, and Charros will leap in a program high on spectacle, featuring revivals of several pieces, some that haven’t been performed in fifteen years.

I asked Salvador Lopez, executive director of Ballet Folklorico and (grandson of the late Ms. Hernandez), about the challenges of presenting vernacular dances, culled from small villages and intended for participation over performance, in a grandiose setting like the Auditorium Theater. Read the rest of this entry »

Khurram Mozaffar in "Bolt from the Blue"/Photo: Michael Brosilow

There’s no denying the noble aspirations of Chicago’s Silk Road Theatre Project, which aims to give voice to those with origins all along its namesake passage, including Asian, Middle Eastern and Mediterranean peoples. For “The DNA Trail: A Genealogy of Short Plays About Ancestry, Identity and Utter Confusion,” they’ve combined that mission with a study of the effects of genetics, a particularly relevant topic with all the recent breakthroughs in the study of the human genome. That’s a lot of ambition, and unfortunately, the seven short plays commissioned by SRTP for “The DNA Trail” don’t quite combine to create an entity that lives up to it. In some of the plays, recitations of college-science-textbook talk combined with almost caricature-like vignettes reminded me of the educational movies we used to enjoy in school, like “Donald [Duck] in Mathmagic Land.” Of these, highlights included Silk Road co-founder Jamil Khoury’s autobiographical upending of stereotypes, “WASP: White Arab Slovak Pole,” and David Henry Hwang’s hilarious exploration of the increasing ability to learn details about our ancestry dating back to the ancients—his protagonist engages with a horny Cleopatra and a violently unhinged Ghengis Khan, who’ve both contributed to his gene pool—”A Very DNA Reunion.” These pleasant pieces are mixed in with more serious fare, from Velina Hasu Houston’s morbidly dreadful “Mother Road” to the moving “Bolt From the Blue,” wherein playwright Shishir Kurup explores the still-inevitable tragedy of certain genetic traits while commenting on the way our digital age fosters both distance and new modes of intimacy.

Steve Scott directs the whole thing with as brisk a pace as the material allows, and the cast often performs at a level surpassing much of the material, especially Khurram Mozaffar, who shifts personalities among the plays with notable empathy. Given the high-concept origins of the work—each playwright commenced with a personal DNA test for inspiration—Silk Road was kind of stuck with whatever grew from its “seeds.” Like any gene pool, the result is a mixed bag. (Brian Hieggelke)

Silk Road Theatre Project‘s “The DNA Trail” plays at The Chicago Temple, 77 West Washington, (312)857-1234 x201, through April 4.

Danielle de Niese, Kyle Ketelsen/Photo: Dan Rest

RECOMMENDED

Sir Peter Hall’s stellar production of Mozart’s “The Marriage of Figaro” has been a regular visitor here since Lyric first premiered it back in 1987. For the first time, however, Hall himself did not make the trip to direct, and so Herbert Kellner took over the reigns, adding much freshness in the process. British conductor and English National Opera music director Edward Gardner was to have made his Lyric debut conducting these performances, but withdrew to be with his wife in England for the birth of their first child. Luckily, Sir Andrew Davis, who made his own Lyric debut with this original production twenty-three years ago, was on hand, and knows this score inside and out. Even the original choreographer, Kenneth von Heidecke, was brought in to stage the infamous wedding-dance scene that, as fans of “Amadeus” may recall, caused a stir with the emperor’s court because dance in opera had been banned. Of course, that was the least of the emperor’s problems with a work that was revolutionary in every sense, from its subject matter of servants besting aristocrats to Mozart’s musical treatment, which set in place a new musical-theater template that has lasted into our own day. Read the rest of this entry »

Cole Simon, Anna Shutz

RECOMMENDED

Project 891’s slapstick ode to the biblical movie epic is intentionally short on production values but long on charm. Its “hey kids, let’s put on a show” aesthetic rivals the glorious cheesiness of the original productions themselves.

Brothers Benny (Matt Lozano) and Phil (Cole Simon) head to the desert to join 3,500 other extras to make a cinematic extravaganza; both become enamored of spunky extras coordinator Louise (Anna Schutz). When the film’s eccentric director (Robert Kearcher) quits and Phil takes over the production, movie mayhem ensues.

The funny hits some speed bumps and both comedy and melodrama are over the top, but the camp doesn’t distract. Simon is leading-man charming, Schutz has likeable ingénue purity and Lozano’s gee-whiz honesty is appealing (someone needs to wipe the boy down after the sweaty battle scenes). The story’s final physical skirmish runs long, but Beau Forbes’ fight choreography is corny entertainment. (Lisa Buscani)

Project 891 at the Chemically Imbalanced Theatre, 1428 W. Irving Park, (773)485-0924, through March 28.

Tamara Anderson, Josh Johnson, Melissa diLeonardo and Malcolm Callan/Photo: Sebastian Aguirre

Joshua Aaron Weinstein’s ode to economic apocalypse reduces the world to its fundamentals and discusses what happens when those basics disappear. Unfortunately, the piece’s flawed narrative collapses; structure’s pretty fundamental.

The piece works as a reminder of the litany of things we lose without our purchasing power. But the main storyline feels tacked on and is divulged when it’s too late to develop. The multimedia falls flat; the garbled audio obscures the storyline and destroys the dramatic tension created in the live text.

The ensemble dredges some good moments out of the ruins. Noah Lepawsky scores as the piece’s holy fool; Malcolm Callan’s brutish landlord seems happy to abandon civility. Brian P. Cicirello captures the irritating voice of compassion; Earliana McLaurin amuses as the smarmy voice of governmental intervention that everyone needs but resents. But the strong performances can’t save a show with a structure that crumbles by the curtain. (Lisa Buscani)

LiveWire Chicago Theatre at the Viaduct Theatre, 3111 N. Western, (312)533-4666, through April 4.

Ashleigh LaThrop and Paige Collins/Photo: Peter Coombs

RECOMMENDED

The true story of self-destructive identical twins who spoke to nobody but themselves for decades while producing wildly theatrical novels and stories alone in their bedroom. The story lends itself beautifully to a dramatic staging, and Dog & Pony maximizes its potential with a brilliantly versatile promenade set, wherein audience members circulate to make real choices about which scenes to see; they also make deft use of various hyper-theatrics, including a gorgeous overhead projector piece, with which to stage the twins’ exuberant fictions and fantasies against their isolated, dejected adolescences. In terms of dramatic range and technical theater, the show is flawless; the actors show impressive flexibility working amongst stylized choreography, sharp naturalism and song-and-dance disco numbers. The show’s only weakness might end up being this very versatility; there is so much stimulation happening at any given moment that the real tragedy of the twins’ sad lives is somewhat lost, and it’s too easy to see the show without giving any real emotional investment. (Monica Westin)

At Steppenwolf Garage, 1624 N. Halsted, (312)335-1650. Through April 25.

Matt Farabee and Alexander Lane/Photo: Peter Coombs

RECOMMENDED

Two suburban teenagers  in the mid-eighties discover punk music and, ostensibly, themselves through it. Hero and antihero, Mickey and Duck alternate between childlike naivete, adolescent fury, and a seen-it-all affectation covering up real crises of identity. That is to say, they’re typical teenage guys (except for being on rollerskates). What’s not typical is how creatively Pavement Group manages to re-imagine this story in their production, forging a fresh look at the ways we join social movements to hide from ourselves. It’s also an incredibly funny play, with dialogue that runs between witty banter and insults of a Beavis and Butthead nature without dumbing the production down, and some of the worst and best names of nonexistent punk bands you’ve never heard of. Acting is controlled, perfectly paced, and full of hormonal energy; and this edge extends to savvy technical theater. But the most impressive feat lies in the final scenes of the play, which explore the real ideology of punk music, as opposed to its mere fashion, and actually manage to make it seem relevant again. (Monica Westin)

At Steppenwolf Garage, 1624 N Halsted, (312)335-1650. Through April 25.

Paige Smith and Eric Leonard/Photo: Peter Coombs

Based on real events in Germany, “Adore” is the love story of a man who wants to eat his lover, and the willing victim he found who wanted to give himself up in the name of true love. “This is an exaggeration of you,” we’re told in the beginning, and the show works hard to make the characters seem both utterly creepy and completely human by giving them numerous speeches about their hearts and turn-ons. It also goes without saying that the show tries to be edgy, which might be its downfall. The problem with this production isn’t the story it tells—which is visceral and painful to watch in a way that would have delighted Artaud—but the way it’s articulated. The writing is often hackneyed, with ruminations about true love and metaphors for being absorbed by our lover that are nothing new, awash with profanity—things are constantly described as “really fucked up” or “fucking real.” While the characters are middle-aged men, they end up speaking like teenagers. The other major problem is a lack of any kind of theatricality; the play is comprised of almost all monologues, delivered as backstory by the major characters against a screen of fucked-up home movies, instant-message conversation on computer screen, and in one case, the current monologue about love letters written in cursive. Indulgent and conceptually simplistic, not much is added in this production to the story, but it will turn your stomach with its narrative of ultimate masochism, if you’re into that kind of thing. (Monica Westin)

At Steppenwolf Garage, 1624 N Halsted, (312)335-1650. Through April 25.