Tara DeFrancisco, No. 36

In this town of performers—theater makers, dancers, comedy creators—you’d think it’d be pretty easy to assemble a list of artistic influencers and innovators. And it is. The challenge is paring that list down to a mere fifty. It’s a testament to the wonders of the performing-arts culture in Chicago that we easily came up with about 200 names when we set out to create this year’s version of The Players. Unfortunately, we’re only listing a fraction of those worthy of your attention, but that’s the problem with an abundance of riches. Hopefully you’ll see a handful of recognizable names and a whole lot more you’ll start noticing from this point on. We’ve retooled the criteria for this year, focusing on onstage artistic achievement, rather than the backstage influence of artistic directors, executive directors and the like—who will get their day again next year. Let the arguments begin. Read the rest of this entry »

Top 5 Shows
“Desire Under the Elms,” Goodman
“Blackbird,” Victory Gardens
“South Pacific,” Lincoln Center Theater
“The Tempest,” Steppenwolf
“Spring Awakening,” Broadway In Chicago 
—Brian Hieggelke

Top 5 Shows
“The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity,” Victory Gardens/Teatro Vista
“An Apology For the Course and Outcome of Certain Events Delivered by Doctor John Faustus on This His Final Evening,” Theater Oobleck
“The Pillowman,” Redtwist
“Frat,” The New Colony
“Red Noses,” Strawdog
—Nina Metz Read the rest of this entry »

The Addams Family at The Oriental/Photo: Samuel Adams

By Brian Hieggelke

As the wind blows the snow sideways this December evening, the weatherman is telling Chicagoans to stay bunkered; the deserted downtown streets reflect their obedience. All save the sidewalk near the intersection of State and Randolph, as TV crews jockey for faces on the red carpet in front of the Ford Center for the Performing Arts Oriental Theatre, where more than 2,000 patrons, including a who’s who of backstage Broadway, are gathering for the world premiere of a new musical featuring a AAA list of talent, onstage and off. “The Addams Family,” with multiple Tony winners Nathan Lane and Bebe Neuwirth in its leads, a book from the librettists of “Jersey Boys” and so on, is certainly Broadway bound, but tonight—tonight—Chicago is the center of theater in the world.

That’s the story of Chicago theater in the zeroes: the decade in which it grew up and got big. Whether it’s the launch and monumental success of Broadway In Chicago, the maturation and astonishing quality of a remarkable number of small and mid-sized companies or the increasing demand for Chicago product and Chicago talent on Broadway, Chicago theater has fully come into its own. Read the rest of this entry »

Peter DeFaria and Randy Steinmeyer in "A Steady Rain" at Chicago Dramatists

Annoyance Theatre
Coed Prison Sluts: $64,000, 5,380 people

The Artistic Home
Peer Gynt: $19,044 box office, 1,200 people

Chicago Dramatists
A Steady Rain: $21,000 box office,1,500 people at CD, 10,000 at Royal George Theatre
Cadillac: $23,000 box office,1,600 people at CD, 1,500 at Theatre on the Lake

Collaboraction
The Intelligent Design of Jenny Chow, $150,000 box office, 6,500 people Read the rest of this entry »

The 2006/07 season brought the grand opening of the new Victory Gardens Biograph Theater, following more than $11 million in renovations

Annoyance Theatre (founded 1987)
“We don’t really have a regular operating budget—just plan as we go along.”
—Jennifer Estlin, President, Annoyance Theatre

The Artistic Home (founded 1998)
End of nineties: $62,000
End of zeroes: $164,500

Bailiwick Chicago (founded 2009)
End of nineties: N/A (Bailiwick Repertory is now defunct)
End of zeroes: $120,000 projected 2010

Chicago Dramatists (founded 1979)
End of nineties: $171,000
End of zeroes: $550,000

Collaboraction (founded 1996)
End of nineties: $50,000
End of zeroes: $500,000

Court Theatre (founded 1955)
End of nineties: $2.6 million
End of zeroes: $3.2 million Read the rest of this entry »

2000

Milestones

500 Clown, Steep Theatre, the side project and Teatro Luna are founded

Broadway In Chicago launches as a joint venture between Live Nation and the Nederlander Organization

Goodman departs its original home in the Art Institute of Chicago and moves into $51 million new digs in the North Loop

Chicago Shakespeare moves into a $24 million theater on Navy Pier

Collaboraction produces its first Sketchbook

The City of Chicago’s Department of Cultural Affairs opens The Storefront Theater

Passings

Michael Maggio, Goodman Theatre Associate Artistic Director and Dean of The Theatre School at DePaul University Read the rest of this entry »

Lindsey Whiting/Photo: Sean Williams

RECOMMENDED

Chances are excellent that anyone reading this dreamt they were flying last night, so psychologists tell us. If you’re lucky, like me, you sometimes wake up remembering that you did, and even the memory of the sensation will give your day a lift. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Despite the fact that you or I could get on a jet today (just heard a passing plane as I write this), somehow being squeezed and seat-belted into a small seat surrounded by strangers and a flight crew passing out peanuts and soft drinks as you occasionally look out tiny windows of a large tube to notice clouds far beneath you is somehow not the same as being free in the air.

Greek religion—now called Greek “mythology” because other religions have since replaced it and so that we won’t get sued for teaching it in our schools—noticed this long ago. It forms the climactic element of the story of Minos II of Crete, grandson of Zeus and Europa, when the inventor Daedalus and his son Icarus are imprisoned and escape via the inventor concocting wings for the two of them. Any grade-schooler knows the tragic end to the story, and at the world premiere of Lookingglass artistic director David Catlin’s “Icarus” that opened on Sunday night, that familiarity is used as an effective flashback device. Read the rest of this entry »

RECOMMENDED

The Daniel Burnham bandwagon has left the station on this, the hundredth year since the famed architect and urban planner pitched his vision for our city and set Chicago on a new course to greatness.  You could settle for sculptural tributes in the park or explore the future of the man’s legacy on public radio, or you could just meet the man yourself.  You have only four chances to catch Lookingglass Theatre Company’s “Our Future Metropolis: Mr. D.H. Burnham Presents a Plain Talk for the Development of Chicago,” adapted and directed by Lookingglass ensemble member John Musial and featuring ensemble member Raymond Fox. The dexterous company, often under the leadership of Musial, has made a fine practice of creating special events celebrating iconic Chicago events and people. Developed through careful research in the Art Institute’s Burnham Library, this show recreates the great thinker’s original sales pitch to Chicago’s powers that were.  Think of it as an early-twentieth-century PowerPoint presentation with monumental stakes. (William Scott)

“Our Future Metropolis” plays July 13, 14, 20 & 21 at Lookingglass Theatre, 821 N. Michigan, (312)337-0665.

On the day of this year’s Tony Awards, two of Chicago’s previous winners, director-playwright Mary Zimmerman, whose revival of “The Arabian Nights” is tearing up the stage at Lookingglass right now, and playwright Tracy Letts, who’s preparing his “Superior Donuts” for a transfer from Steppenwolf to Broadway this fall, appeared before a packed house of book lovers at the Printers Row Lit Fest on a panel moderated by retired Tribune theater critic Richard Christiansen.

Here are a few of the more memorable moments:

Letts on why he started writing plays in addition to acting: “To write roles for other out-of-work actors like myself.”

Zimmerman on her first work: “The story of Lady Godiva—it had one line in it.”

Letts on casting “August: Osage County”: “At Steppenwolf, we have an ensemble, so we try not to hurt any feelings.”

Letts on writing the screenplay for “August: Osage County,” which he’s doing now: “It’s terrible… just terrible. It’s like a combination of a bad adaptation with ‘Erin Brockovich”… avoid the movie at all costs!”

Zimmerman on fruitlessly rewriting certain lines over and over again in her plays and then hearing them on stage: “It strikes the ears so awkwardly and I’m just like ‘oh, just get past the moment, please!”

In the fall of 1992, the relatively young, at six years, and far-from-institutional Lookingglass Theatre Company opened up a storefront production of “The Arabian Nights,” and the even younger publication Newcity sent one of its junior critics, Chris Jones, to see the play. He raved. The play became a breakaway hit that set the course in many ways for what Lookingglass has become. Newcity’s first senior editor Nate Lee penned a cover story that November, as the production moved from the confines of Chicago Filmmakers to the larger space inhabited by Remains Theatre. In the process of reporting, he insisted I see it and took me along. It was unforgettable, and probably had much to do with our growing and sustained commitment to theater coverage. (Though in fairness, Nate’s passion for Chicago theater, or theatre, as he insisted, from our very first issues set the pace from day one.)

In honor of the revisiting of “The Arabian Nights” currently underway at Lookingglass, we’ve posted both Chris’ original review and Nate’s cover story, for your contemplation. And, of course, here’s our review of the current production by Dennis Polkow. So how does it hold up, all these years later? I’ve yet to revisit it myself, but Chris Jones, now writing for the Tribune, says it’s even better. (Brian Hieggelke)