2,444 stories from chicagoreader.com
Chicago native Inda Craig-Galván takes theatergoers on a heart-to-heart journey in A Hit Dog Will Holler, a two-hander that underlines the trauma and resilience experienced by Black women…
It's beginning to feel like we're having a mini festival this year of plays about the romantic and professional conflicts facing artist (or academic) couples, between First Floor's Hate Fuck…
"If the Internet taught me anything," says Logan, a shaggy-haired, newly-out incoming college freshman played by Ben Ballmer, "it was that gay people are awesome." He's blessed in that every…
It looks so simple: two people occupy a stage, waiting for something and talking about nothing. But Waiting for Godot works because Samuel Beckett was a genius, and because waiting itself…
Sometimes more didactic than dramatically sound, Ella Hickson's The Writer remains enraging and engaging as it offers a graphic crash course in the perils of playwriting while female. And, f…
Last summer, Hell in a Handbag presented A Fine Feathered Murder: A Miss Marbled Mystery, a spoof of Agatha Christie's famous spinster detective, Miss Marple. Now, they're putting Angela Lan…
Double Michaels! Triple threats! Joe Jackson's aggression! MJ the Musical titillates in a new touring production of the Broadway hit navigating the chaotic life of King of Pop Michael Jackso…
Seeing "Springtime for Hitler" in all its bad-taste glory hits a little differently when it's staged in Skokie in 2023. The suburb is of course the home of the Illinois Holocaust Museum, whi…
Settled in the grass at Moore Park in the Austin neighborhood, a baby clad in a vegetable-patterned onesie coos to the music, while a toddler wriggles, wiggly worms in hand, to the aptly nam…
Next to Normal is a musical that takes on a mental health crisis to destigmatize. This is a good thing. Go to Paramount's Copley Theatre for Jim Corti's staging. Be proud, open your heart, a…
At a time when so many larger, established theaters are cutting back their seasons, laying off staff, or suspending operations, smaller theaters, like the relatively young Forest Park Theatr…
Loy Webb's professional playwriting debut, The Light, caused quite a stir in its 2018 world premiere with New Colony (later renamed the New Coordinates, who are now defunct). The onetime cri…
July 27, 4:58 PM, in the sweltering afternoon of a hothouse week, my friend Jeff and I arrived at a kiosk between a shuttered Starbucks and a Cash4Gold stand on the pedway level of Block 37.…
Long recognized as Chicago's most diverse neighborhood, Albany Park has also served for generations as the destination for immigrant families. As the University of Chicago's Chicago Studies …
It's not clear that there's anything funny about the life story or legacy of John D. Rockefeller, which raises the question of Corn Productions' attraction to the material and goal in presen…
Harold Pinter's 1974 play No Man's Land occupies the territory between his earlier "comedies of menace," such as The Birthday Party and The Caretaker, and the more overtly political work he'…
The Mercury Theater production of this five-time Tony-nominated musical re-creates the 80s with such abandon that the audience's fervor was palpable (and loud) on the night I attended. Tommy…
The stages at Chicago Shakespeare Theater are accustomed to classic tales of daring sword fights, magic spells, and a prince in disguise"just the kinds of stories that Belle loves to read. A…
The description for Henok Negash's Meant to Be at the Chicago Magic Lounge makes it sound a little like a navel-gazing self-actualization exercise. Negash, we're told, "specializes in offeri…
There are days I don't think I can handle one more essay on the precarious state of the American theater. It's not that I'm in denial about the existential threats facing so many institution…
George Brant's Marie and Rosetta, now at Northlight in a production directed by E. Faye Butler, is a tribute to the contributions of Black women in gospel, rhythm and blues, and rock, as emb…
Is there a Shakespeare comedy better suited for an outdoor production in a park in July than A Midsummer Night's Dream? Much of the play itself takes place outdoors in the summer, in the woo…
Dorothy Parker once famously observed, "If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second-greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of The Elements o…
An icon and legend, the late Princess Diana, first wife to King Charles III, lends herself to many different interpretations. Jillann Gabrielle has established herself as a creator and p…
Ian Damont Martin directs the world premiere of Nathan Alan Davis's post-everything meta intergalactic meditation on what it's all about. Akwasi (David Goodloe)"on a bare stage save for a bl…
