Here’s the press release from the Jeff Awards:

JEFF AWARDS COMMITTEE PRESENTS NON-EQUITY AWARDS FOR THE 2008 – 2009 SEASON

Theo Ubique Receives Highest Number of Awards;
“Evita” and “Our Town” Garner Outstanding Production Awards

Chicago, IL.     Chicago’s nationally-renowned storefront and black box theatre community gathered at the Park West today for its annual celebration as the Jeff Awards Committee gave out 26 Non-Equity Jeff Awards in 24 categories. In addition, a Special Award was given to Pegasus Players’ founder Arlene Crewdson for her lifelong contributions to Chicago theatre. The festive event was emceed by actor-composer Jon Steinhagen, appearing in that role for the third time.
Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s the press release from the Jeff Awards:

The Jeff Awards
Announces 2009 Non-Equity Nominations

Lifeline (14) and Theo Ubique (13) Are Top-Nominated Companies;
“Evita,” “Mariette in Ecstasy,” and “Rose and the Rime”
Garner 7 Nominations Each

Chicago, IL.  The Jeff Awards today announced 114 nominations in 24 categories for Non-Equity Jeff Awards, which honor excellence in Chicago theatres not under a union contract, for productions that opened between April 1, 2008, and March 31, 2009.  The Jeff Awards judged the opening nights of 130 productions offered by 57 non-Equity producing organizations and recommended 54 of them for further judging, making those 54 eligible for Non-Equity Jeff Award nominations in all categories. Read the rest of this entry »

Here is the press release from The Hypocrites

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

THE HYPOCRITES ANNOUNCES 2009-10 SEASON

CHICAGO, IL – The Hypocrites announces its 13th Season of presenting bold art to courageous audiences. The 2009-10 Season will include an original adaptation of a gothic classic, an existential masterpiece and one of the seediest musicals ever written. With each production, The Hypocrites’ will continue to challenge the audience, the artists and the theatrical form. Read the rest of this entry »

Lookingglass Theatre’s revival of “Our Town” has its touching moments, some fine acting and has been sensitively directed by Anna D. Shapiro and Jessica Thebus, so along with the fact that a recognizable “name” (David Schwimmer) is in the cast who will undoubtedly sell tickets, I guess Lookingglass has an easy hit on their hands. But the production is so lacking in theatrical vigor, emotional involvement or intellectual stimulation that I left the theater wondering if Thornton Wilder’s 70-year old drama has dated badly, was overrated to start with or failed to move me because it doesn’t speak to my personal life experience. I’m pretty sure my ambivalence is the result of all three. Indeed, this is the kind of evening you describe in annoyingly equivocal statements: it’s not bad, but it’s not that good; it isn’t boring, but it isn’t exciting either.

“Our Town,” of course, is Wilder’s sentimental look at small-town American life in the fictional village of Grover’s Corners (population 2,600) at the turn of the twentieth century. The play spans thirteen years over three acts but is so dramatically inert that all the action blends together into one seemingly continuous day in the life of the Gibbs (the town doctor, his wife and their children) and the Webbs (the town newspaper editor, his wife and their children). They live the kind of lives where wives gossip over the stringing of beans and a trip to the battlegrounds of the Civil War counts as a holiday vacation. Nobody has to worry about AIDS, bad credit scores, job security or mushrooming mortgage payments. Instead, their hearts are captured by nature (birds; the changing of seasons), their minds molded by the non-threatening literature of “Robinson Crusoe” and the Bible. To say that life depicted in “Our Town” is dull and conservative is an understatement: Thornton Wilder makes Chekhov look like Joe Orton, and Grover’s Corners makes Lake Wobegon look like Sodom and Gomorrah.

It isn’t until the final act that “Our Town” delves into darker waters, when Emily Webb (Laura Eason), whose courtship with and marriage to George Gibbs (Schwimmer) has been charted in the first two acts, dies in childbirth and returns from the dead to pronounce that life’s too short and that humans take the little things for granted. “There’s something way down deep about every human being that’s eternal,” ponderously proclaims the stage manger (Joey Slotnick). And in case the message doesn’t immediately register, Janice Pytel’s cream-colored neutral outfits—linen suits for the men; blouses and skirts for the women—have by this point adopted an anachronistic splash of modern dress (jeans; khakis) or a black-colored piece of clothing to drive home this play’s universal and grim sentiment.

If this revival had found a greater purpose than as a nostalgic trip down an exclusive memory lane, or become something other than the theatrical equivalent of comfort food, I may have bought into it. If it had found an invigorating way to present an old war horse, I probably would have swallowed it hook, line and sinker. (Compare this revival to Sean Graney and the Hypocrites’ take on Eugene O’ Neill’s “The Hairy Ape” at the Goodman—problematic, but at least a risky endeavor attempting to make a statement of modern times via a classic text.) About the only nostalgia I experienced was when scenic designer John Musial’s imaginative set was in full flourish: hundreds of feet of Christmas lights strewn in and around the lighting instruments and bric-a-brac of everyday life (furniture, miniature houses, the moon), suspended high above the empty playing space and suggesting a heavenly cosmos of twinkling lights. It reminded me of John Napier’s celestial junkyard of a set for the musical “Cats,” had that design been turned upside down and hung from the roof.

And yet. The play’s durability proves that the piece speaks to millions of Americans on some level. On opening night, it clearly spoke to the middle-aged couple who were clasping hands like high-school sweethearts during George and Emily’s courtship scene over an ice cream soda. And it obviously spoke to the beaming single father of two young daughters in the front row, whose loving and protective embrace seemed to intensify as the show progressed. Maybe for them, “Our Town” is their town. For me, sitting through this play was like being stuck at the Cracker Barrel for two hours with a bunch of boring Republicans. (Fabrizio O. Almeida)

At Water Tower Water Works,  821 N. Michigan.  Wed-Fri 7:30pm/Sat 3pm.& 7:30pm/Sun 3 pm. $30-$60.  Through April 5.

RECOMMENDED

Eugene O’Neill’s expressionist nightmare of proletariat anger in America, astutely updated by director Sean Graney and the Hypocrites. Chris Sullivan gives a fervent, monumental performance as Yank, a coal-shoveling hulk aboard a steamship whose self-consciousness is first expressed in tirades about his adamant control over the world: “Hell in de stokehole? Sure! It takes a man to work in hell. Hell, sure, dat’s my fav’rite climate. I eat it up! I get fat on it! It’s me makes it hot! It’s me makes it roar! It’s me makes it move! Sure, on’y for me everyting stops. It all goes dead, get me?” After the daughter of a steel industrialist visits the engine room and, horrified, calls Yank a “filthy beast,” he struggles violently and increasingly articulately against his role in society back on land, through a series of highly stylized, feverish scenes pitching him against various institutions that would ignore or reject him. The streak of genius of this production lies in the role of cultural relocations and abstractions presented in each scene, from scatting prisoners writhing like snakes around Yank in a claustrophobic jail cell to 5th Avenue socialites leaving church reimagined as disco-goers; in stark contrast Yank stumbles, the epitome of cruel realism, marking in no uncertain terms the theater and audience as a place of privilege and fantasy. The final chilling scene, in which Yank confronts a silent ape at the zoo, actually draws shudders. Technically spectacular lighting, sound and, especially, set—based around a three-story ship’s cross-section that offers as beautiful an embodiment of social strata I’ve seen—further inform and modernize the truly avant-garde production. (Monica Westin)

At the Goodman Theatre, 170 N Dearborn, (312)443-3811. Through Februrary 21.

By Dennis Polkow

Relaxing backstage on a break between rehearsals, you barely have a chance to ask if the Lookingglass production of “Our Town” coming on the heels of the much-acclaimed David Cromer production that began at the Hypocrites last year and is opening next week in New York is a coincidence before co-directors Anna D. Shapiro, 2008 Tony Award winner for “August: Osage County,” and Jessica Thebus, both nod their heads in unison.

Shapiro offers that two productions so close together may only seem odd to “those of us who live and breathe theater rather than for ordinary people with a life who may like theater, but who probably have one theater that they principally go to.” Did either of them see the Hypocrites’ production? “Oh, sure,” says Thebus, “we went together. It was a beautiful production and very inspiring.” Did it confirm anything that the pair might—or might not—do in their own production? Long pause, broken by Shapiro: “Yes, and yes, though we would never tell you what those might be.” “Ditto,” shoots back Thebus. “Keep in mind,” says Shapiro, “we are all good friends. David and I went to school together back to high school and we cheer one another on. This is not competitive like sports: David texted the day we began rehearsals and wished us well, and I said, ‘Gee, it’s going so well, is it really this easy?’ and he’s like, ‘That’s the secret, it’s like singing “Danny Boy,” you really can’t screw it up.’”

Contrary to the notion that the pair are bringing “new life to an old chestnut,” Shapiro and Thebus say they have always been fascinated with “Our Town,” ever since they first read it back in high school. “I never thought this was anything less than a great play,” says Shapiro. “Even seeing a high-school production reduces me to crippled weeping. I have been trying to get my students to direct it forever, but they didn’t know how great it is. Now, they are all going to want to do it.” “It is iconic,” agrees Thebus, “like the Bible or Shakespeare.”

So why do “Our Town” at Lookingglass and not Steppenwolf, where Shapiro is ensemble member and where Thebus is artistic associate? “It’s not what people might think, namely that no one at Steppenwolf wanted to do it,” offers Shapiro. “The fact is, everyone wanted to do it, and there were three people with their hands up ahead of me who haven’t gotten it together yet, so it would be a long, long wait there. I’m not big enough.” Even with a shiny new Tony Award? “I’m not big enough physically,” Shapiro jokes.

And why do it together? “We are both huge devotees of the play,” says Shapiro, and both teach it at Northwestern and have always loved it. “We have a common vision,” says Thebus, Shapiro cutting in, “and mutual respect and friendship. Together, there is more dynamism and because there are two of us, everything is an external conversation, which is great. Usually, directing a show is a very solitary and lonely experience, but the chance to do this together makes this very special. We will probably write a book on the process of putting this together,  it has been that fascinating.”

“You read it one way when you’re very young,” muses Thebus, “but as you’re older, another layer of meaning emerges and you think, ‘Ah, that’s what that line means.’” “There is a power there, in coming back to something familiar from when we are young and revisiting it in a whole new way,” says Shapiro. “And here is this company [Lookingglass] that is now 20 years old and the folks all went to college together so are already a close community and all of us, including David [Cromer], are exactly the same age now and at the same point in the arc of our lives where life and death are on our minds and we are seeing that from the prism of this play.”

Does casting David Schwimmer of “Friends” fame as George Gibbs, though, carry a risk of pop-culture recognition, something akin to Daniel Radcliffe of “Harry Potter” fame doing “Equus”? “Let me tell you,” scolds Shapiro, “that kid [Radcliffe] was amazing. This is Chicago, and I think most people know, or should know, that David was a theater actor here long before television found him. We should all be so multi-talented.”

Shapiro’s own success with “August: Osage County,” which won her the 2008 Tony Award for Best Director and which is still running on Broadway and in London, and will begin a national tour in July, is no less impressive, but she feels that it is time to move on to other things. “The rhythm of the life of a theater director is such that you start a project and you end a project, but this keeps sprouting elsewhere,” Shapiro says. “Don’t get me wrong: I am enormously grateful for this association and for what this show has achieved and really do think that every actor involved with it should get a house and a car. But it is tough to keep coming back again and again to the rehearsal room and refresh the show and I’ve had my say with it.  If I wanted a Starbucks franchise, I’d have bought a Starbucks franchise.”

“Our Town” previews through February 20 and runs February 21-April 5 at Lookingglass Theatre, 821 N. Michigan, $30-$60; (312)337-0665.

What makes Chicago’s theater world special? We picked up the latest issue of Entertainment Weekly for clues. In the cover story, “CSI” star William Petersen explains his decision to leave his role as one of the top paid actors in television, earning a rumored $600,000 an episode, to move back to Chicago and Chicago theater: “It was too safe for me at this point. So I needed to try and break that, and the way to do that, for me, is the theater.” EW went on to credit Petersen for much of the show’s success, notably bringing a theatrical ensemble philosophy to play in its production. Or consider the runaway success of Steppenwolf’s “August: Osage County,” which transferred to Broadway,  receiving critical acclaim and multiple Tony Awards, not by shaking it up with Broadway “names” but instead by virtually transferring the Steppenwolf production intact, with the addition of lead producer and fellow Chicagoan Steve Traxler. What makes Chicago theater—or for that matter, Chicago dance or any other form of performance practiced on our stages—special? We’d contend it’s the power of the ensemble, the spirit of collaboration that champions artistic risk-taking and subordinates the commercial. And so, in that spirit, the critical ensemble responsible for Newcity’s ongoing stage coverage presents our take on the most influential people on and offstage in Chicago. Read the rest of this entry »

Top 5 Shows

“Caroline, or Change,” Court Theatre

“A House with No Walls,” Timeline Theatre

“The Glass Menagerie,” Steppenwolf Theatre

“No Darkness Round My Stone,” Trap Door Theatre

“The Birthday Party,” Signal Theater

—Monica Westin

Top 5 Shows

“Jon,” Collaboraction

“A Very Merry Unauthorized Children’s Scientology Pageant,” A Red Orchid

“Be More Chill,” Griffin Theatre

“Men of Tortuga,” Profiles

“Picked Up,” Neo-Futurists

—Nina Metz

Top 5 Theatrical Experiences

“Caroline, or Change,” Court Theatre

“Columnibus,” Raven Theatre

“As You Like It,” Writers’ Theatre

“The Comedy of Errors,” Chicago Shakespeare Theater

“Romeo y Julieta” (Staged Reading), Chicago Shakespeare Theater/Shakespeare in Español

—Fabrizio O. Almeida

Top 5 Guilty Pleasures

“Jarred: A Hoodoo Comedy” by Tanya Saracho, Teatro Luna

“Speech and Debate” by Stephen Karam, ATC

“Dead Man’s Cell Phone” by Sarah Ruhl, Steppenwolf

“The Little Dog Laughed” by Douglas Carter Beane, About Face Theatre

“After Ashley” by Gina Gionfriddo, Stage Left Theatre

—Fabrizio O. Almeida

Top 5 New Plays

“Kita y Fernanda” by Tanya Saracho, 16^th Street Theater

“The U.N. Inspector” by David Farr and James Sherman, Next Theatre

“Dead Man’s Cell Phone” by Sarah Ruhl, Steppenwolf Theatre

“Our Enemies: Lively Scenes of Love and Combat” by Yussef El Guindi, Silk Road Theatre Project

“Superior Donuts” by Tracy Letts, Steppenwolf Theatre

—Fabrizio O. Almeida

Top 5 Revivals

“The Maids,” Writers’ Theatre

“The Lion in Winter,” Writers’ Theatre

“Requiem for a Heavyweight,” Shattered Globe

“Plaza Suite,” Eclipse Theatre Company

“The Birthday Party,” Signal Ensemble Theatre

—Fabrizio O. Almeida

Top 5 Play Revivals

“Our Town,” Hypocrites

“The Lion in Winter,” Writers Theatre

“Requiem for a Heavyweight,” Shattered Globe

“Journey’s End,” Griffin

“M Butterfly,” BoHo

—Dennis Polkow

Top 5 Memorable Productions by a Smaller Theatre Troupe

“Multi-Purpose Doom,” Sandbox Theatre Project

“The Further Adventures of Hedda Gabler,” Dog & Pony

“Termen Vox Machina,” Oracle Productions

“On My Parents’ 100^th Wedding Anniversary,” Side Project

“The Last Days of Judas Iscariot” (original mounting), Gift Theatre

—Fabrizio O. Almeida

Top 5 Directors

Ann Filmer for “Kita y Fernanda,” 16^th Street Theater

Charles Newell for “Caroline, or Change,” Court Theatre

Sean Graney for “Edward II,” Chicago Shakespeare Theater

William Brown for “As You Like It,” Writers’ Theatre

Greg Kolack for “Columbinus,” Raven Theatre

—Fabrizio O. Almeida

Top 5 Musicals

“Caroline, or Change,” Court Theatre

“Grey Gardens,” Northlight Theatre

“Tell Me On A Sunday,” Bailiwick Theater

“The Full Monty,” Marriott Lincolnshire Theatre

“All Shook Up,” Marriott Lincolnshire Theatre

—Fabrizio O. Almeida

Top 5 New Musicals

“Caroline, or Change,” Court Theatre

“Grey Gardens,” Northlight Theatre

“Songs for a New World,” Porchlight

“The Ballad of Emmett Till,” Goodman Theatre

“I Am Who I Am: The Story of Teddy Pendergrass,” Black Ensemble Theater

—Dennis Polkow

Top 5 Musical Revivals

“Tell Me on a Sunday,” Bailiwick Theater

“Sweet Charity,” Drury Lane Oakbrook

“1776,” Signal Ensemble

“Jacques Brel’s Lonesome Lovers of the Night,” Theo Ubique

“Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” Circle Theatre

—Dennis Polkow

Top 5 Worst Musicals

“Shout! The Mod Musical,” Drury Lane Water Tower

“Avenue Q,” Broadway in Chicago

“Dirty Dancing,” Broadway in Chicago

“Russian on the Side,” Royal George Theater

“Gutenberg! The Musical,” Royal George Theater

—Dennis Polkow

Top 5 Worst Musicals

“Dirty Dancing,” Broadway in Chicago

“The Kid from Brooklyn,” Mercury Theater

“Gutenberg! The Musical!,” Royal George Theatre

“Jekyll & Hyde—The Musical,” Bohemian Theatre Ensemble

“Sweeney Todd,” Broadway in Chicago

—Fabrizio O. Almeida

Top 5 Operas

“Manon,” Lyric Opera

“The Abduction From the Seraglio,” Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Ravinia

“Lulu,” Lyric Opera

“Porgy and Bess,” Lyric Opera (second cast)

“Don Giovanni,” Chicago Opera Theater

—Dennis Polkow

Top 5 Productions of Shakespeare

“As You Like It,” Writers Theatre

“Comedy of Errors,” Chicago Shakespeare

“Much Ado About Nothing,” First Folio

“Merchant of Venice,” Boho

“Twelfth Night,” City Lit

—Dennis Polkow

Top 5 Touring Shows

“Saint Joan,” Shaw Festival Canada, Chicago Shakespeare

“Cirque du Soleil: Kooza,” United Center

“The Drowsy Chaperone,” Broadway in Chicago

“My Fair Lady,” National Theatre London, Broadway in Chicago

“Jesus Christ Superstar,” Broadway in Chicago

—Dennis Polkow

Top 5 Holiday Shows

“The Christmas Schooner,” Bailiwick Theater

“A Dublin Carol,” Steppenwolf Theatre

“A Christmas Carol,” Writers Theatre

“Radio City Music Hall Christmas Spectacular,” Rosemont Theatre

“The Seafarer,” Steppenwolf Theatre

—Dennis Polkow

Top 5 Comedy Shows

“Impress These Apes,” Blewt!

“Shatter,” Pat O’Brien’s solo show at Second City e.t.c.

“Steve and Jordan, Respectively” i.O. Theater

“Brother, Can You Spare Some Change?” Second City e.t.c.

“PennyBear: A Collection of Miniature Plays and Curious Diversions,” Apollo Theater Studio

—Nina Metz

Top 5 Female Performances

Janet Ulrich Brooks, “Golda’s Balcony,” Pegasus Players

Christina Anthony, “Brother, Can You Spare Some Change?” Second City e.t.c.

Erin Barlow, “Red Angel,” LiveWire

Sarah Goeden, “13 Dead Husbands,” Sansculottes Theater

Rachel Quinn, “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” Circle Theatre

—Nina Metz

Top 5 Male Performances

David Cromer, “Our Town,” The Hypocrites

Usman Ally, “Celebrity Row,” American Theater Company

Steve Wilson, “Red Angel,” LiveWire

Edward Thomas-Herrera, “The Last Days of Beast,” Live Bait’s Fillet of Solo Festival

Daniel Behrendt, “Beggars in the House of Plenty,” Mary-Arrchie

—Nina Metz

Top 5 Out-of-the-Box Performances

“Inner Space,” Joffrey Ballet’s American Moderns

“Walking Mad,” Hubbard Street Dance Winter Series

“The Young Ladies Of…,” About Face Theatre

“Dr. Egg and the Man With No Ear,” Redmoon Theater

“One on One,” Hubbard Street Dance Winter Series

—William Rogers

Top 5 Dance Shows by Chicago Companies

“The Sky Hangs Down Too Close,” Lucky Plush Productions

“Nuevo Folk,” Luna Negra Dance Theater

“De-Evolution of Mudwoman,” Breakbone DanceCo

“Vintage Modern,” Same Planet Different World Dance

“American Moderns,” Joffrey Ballet

—Sharon Hoyer

Top 5 Overrated Productions

“Dave DaVinci Saves the Universe,” House Theatre

“Dirty Dancing,” Broadway in Chicago

“Shining City,” Goodman Theatre

“The Glass Menagerie,” Shattered Globe Theatre

“Scenes from the Big Picture,” Seanachai Theatre

—Fabrizio O. Almeida

Top 5 Theatrical Disappointments

“Dirty Dancing,” Broadway in Chicago

“Les Miserables,” Marriott Lincolnshire Theatre

“Yohen,” Silk Road Theatre Project

“Richard III,” Strawdog Theatre

“Macbeth,” Greasy Joan & Co.

—Fabrizio O. Almeida

 

RECOMMENDED

It takes some real imagination to shed new light on a shopworn theatrical warhorse that you thought you knew inside-out, but David Cromer’s staging of Thornton Wild’s “Our Town” is able to achieve that rare and remarkable feat of making a classic so fresh as to seem as if you are experiencing it for the very first time.

A remount of the Hypocrites surprise spring hit that closed while shows were still selling out, the production is back for a second go-round. If, like me, you missed—or yes, even avoided—this the first time around, whatever you do, take advantage of this limited opportunity to rectify that situation.

Cromer himself plays the Stage Manager who tells you the story, straddling sensitivity with an almost ethereal detachment as he does so. The Hypocrites ensemble as the residents of Grover’s Corners make you believe that they are living out the ordinary lives of New England townspeople a century ago as they interact with each other and the audience. A bond is forged between us, and then, as a couple of kids begin to date and gradually fall in love and marry, we are there, as their honored guests and we experience their agonies and ecstasies right along with them.

All of this, of course, is done in the subtle style that Wilder specifies, with virtually no scenery or props, but unlike many past productions, the actors are so convincing here at creating their surrounding universe that we buy into Wilder’s convention completely. What an unexpected and splendid shock it is to our senses it is when, at the play’s climax, we leave the town cemetery to go back to a day in a character’s childhood that, like all memories that stay with us, is staged in such a way as to make it more vivid than the seemingly more banal world of the everyday here and now. That shattering effect is the theatrical equivalent of a black-and-white Kansas Dorothy opening the door to a Technicolor Oz, and it is so jarring that you end up transported: indeed, virtually teleported.

Yes, the morale of this play is something most of us have heard since we had to read it back in grade school. Yeah, little things matter. Life viewed from death means savor it, it doesn’t last. Sure. Yawn. The brilliance of this production is that it doesn’t tell you that, it supplies you with your own virtual experience of doing exactly that in such a profound way that I found myself taken back to a similar day in my own childhood that the character experiences (okay, it was her twelfth birthday, my tenth). I suddenly remembered things from that day that I had not thought about in decades. And judging from the transfigured faces of audience members surrounding the action, there were multiple and simultaneous epiphanies going on as well. Theater just doesn’t get any better than that. (Dennis Polkow)

Through October 26, Chopin Theatre Studio, 1543 West Division; $20-$25, (773)989-7352.

RECOMMENDED

“What’s the robbery of a bank compared to the founding of a bank?” quips Gregory Hardigan as bandit Mack the Knife as he is about to be hanged, a powerful reminder that Kurt Weill’s 1928 “The Threepenny Opera,” though now 80 years old, could well have been taken right out of today’s headlines.

Few shows have redefined musical theater the way that this one has, so far ahead of its time that it has rarely been presented without censorship or controversy, its many detractors ranging from Adolf Hitler to Joseph McCarthy.

The first musical ever presented by the Hypocrites, this is the Marc Blitzstein 1954 English adaptation but freely adapted with uncredited contemporary commentary that instill more immediacy and sense of Bertolt Brecht’s original; one of the beggars, we are told, is Sarah Palin with an outstretched hand, “searching for a clue.”

The beggars interact with the audience, most of whom surround the performers across two large, kidney-shaped tables and are, in true Brechtian fashion, often pushed beyond the theatrical “fourth wall” that Brecht fought so hard to pull down. At one climactic moment, for instance, a cell phone rings, and the performers become indignant until a cast member ends up discovering that it’s his own, uttering a public and penitent “Excuse me,” and takes a call that we all overhear. Brecht would have loved it.

Most productions of “Threepenny Opera” bracket the drama and spotlight the songs, but here, the Hypocrites bracket the songs and spotlight the drama. The songs themselves come across as patchy quiltwork as amplification is suddenly beefed way up with louder sound emanating from the corner than from the performers themselves, throwing balances off and spotlighting vocal limitations of performers which are often considerable, particularly constantly contrasted against first-rate acting chops.

That jarring juxtaposition could well be eliminated, however, with a minimum of vocal coaching and with Weill’s tiny but carefully specified timbre-significant ensemble of instrumentalists incorporated into the mix instead of merely a distant solo piano.

Still, the overall spirit that the Hypocrites achieve is so right—a reminder perhaps, that beggar and actor are often synonyms?—this is time well spent. (Dennis Polkow)

At Steppenwolf Merle Reskin Garage Theatre, 1624 N Halsted, (312)335-1650. $20-$25. Through October 12.