Craig Wright's play is about the 9/11 attacks only in the sense that, say, "Glengarry Glen Ross" is about real estate. His 2003 dramedy is set comfortably far away in distance (it takes plac…
Imagine the sturdy films about workplace mundanity and absurdity, "Clerks" and "Office Space" filtered through George Orwell's "1984," and you might have a glancing idea of what David Jacobi…
It's the oldest American story in the book. Lighting out for the territory. Getting on the road or the train or the plane and going somewhere, anywhere " as long as it isn't here. In "Fugiti…
Set in 1933, William Inge's "A Loss of Roses" takes an unflinching snapshot of people in a small town suffering from "a depression of the heart, a drought of the soul," as the voice of an of…
"Accidents of fate are just the probabilities playing out," says Liz " half of the two-lives-in-one protagonist, Elizabeth, in "If/Then," the heart-on-sleeve musical about roads taken and op…
"Accidents of fate are just the probabilities playing out," says Liz " half of the two-lives-in-one protagonist, Elizabeth, in "If/Then," the heart-on-sleeve musical about roads taken and op…
You could say that Sarah Gubbins' "Cocked" feels especially timely in the wake of the spree shootings in Kalamazoo, Mich., this weekend. But sadly, those events happen so often now that we l…
Sisters are doing it for themselves " with a glitzy assist from an on-the-run disco queen wannabe " in Lincolnshire. And unless you've given up silly-but-soulful musicals for Lent, Marriott …
I've never seen earlier incarnations of the 2006 musical version of "High Fidelity," based on the 2000 film starring John Cusack, itself based on Nick Hornby's novel. It had a brief Broadway…
If British playwright Joe Orton hadn't already used it, "What the Butler Saw" would be a highly apropos title for James Still's 2001 solo play. Instead, he went with "Looking Over the Presid…
The toast of Mayfair is back in town, and she's looking a little desperate. Sally Bowles, I mean " not "Cabaret." The touring version of the Roundabout Theatre Company's 2014 revival of Sam…
The toast of Mayfair is back in town, and she's looking a little desperate. Sally Bowles, I mean " not "Cabaret." The touring version of the Roundabout Theatre Company's 2014 revival of Sam …
Before "Mad Men," Todd Haynes' 2002 film "Far From Heaven" cornered the post-millennial market on the rotting underbelly of mid-century upper-middle-class suburbia. But while "Mad Men" took …
Before "Mad Men," Todd Haynes' 2002 film "Far From Heaven" cornered the post-millennial market on the rotting underbelly of mid-century upper-middle-class suburbia. But while "Mad Men" took …
Rohina Malik's new play, now in a world premiere at Berwyn's always-enterprising 16th Street Theater, could almost be described as a bait-and-switch " except what you end up catching is a lu…
Where do we learn to hate our own vessel? How do we figure out how to carry it with grace and gratitude throughout the span of our lives? Those questions are the spine of Danielle Pinnock's…
Where do we learn to hate our own vessel? How do we figure out how to carry it with grace and gratitude throughout the span of our lives? Those questions are the spine of Danielle Pinnock's …
Eugene O'Neill and Ralph Ellison generally don't hang out together, in my experience. But as I watched Monty Cole's taut and imaginative staging of O'Neill's "The Hairy Ape" at Oracle Theatr…
Eugene O'Neill and Ralph Ellison generally don't hang out together, in my experience. But as I watched Monty Cole's taut and imaginative staging of O'Neill's "The Hairy Ape" at Oracle Theatr…
"Is there anything you can't do, Jeeves?" asks the perpetually-in-a-pickle Bertie Wooster of his stoic manservant " to which the latter responds "I couldn't say, sir." And indeed, over the p…
There's a wistful irony threaded throughout Signal Ensemble's final production. In Heidi Schreck's "The Consultant," a struggling graphic designer at an equally struggling pharmaceutical mar…
There's a wistful irony threaded throughout Signal Ensemble's final production. In Heidi Schreck's "The Consultant," a struggling graphic designer at an equally struggling pharmaceutical mar…
There's a whole lotta shaking going on this month in the western suburbs with two musicals about teen culture, late 1950s-to-early 1960s style. Aurora's Paramount Theatre is opening a new pr…
Something's rotten in the duchy of Malfi. Lust, revenge, double-crosses " even the holy books are poisonous. But in Christopher Marino's high-octane staging of "The Duchess of Malfi" for Tra…
A belated Christmas card has just arrived in Chicago theater. It's a bit grimy around the edges and smells like it spent the holidays passed out in a gin joint. But tarnished tinsel still sh…