126 stories by "Mary Wisniewski"
In a Northwest Side warehouse, you can visit the apartment of a Mexican family, anxious because the father has been deported. Or a multi-generation Filipino family, about to cook supper. The…
Midsommer's new production, playing in Chicago parks through August 13, shows that in the right hands, "Cymbeline" is funny, compelling and surprisingly touching.
George Brant's "Marie and Rosetta" at Northlight Theatre offers both great music and a real story. Directed by E. Faye Butler, it's about the friendship and musical collaboration between Sis…
A twenty-five-year-old anniversary is tough to achieve in a marriage, and maybe a bigger challenge in the art world. Now, Congo Square is not only continuing to produce new work, but is plan…
"Another Marriage," a play by Steppenwolf ensemble member Kate Arrington, takes on the reality of how both the birth of a child and unequal career success can affect a relationship.
Written by John Pielmeier in 1979, the play is about a young nun named Agnes found bleeding and unconscious in her convent bedroom. The audience gets the full, hurricane blast of this perfor…
When a terrific singing actress is in the role of Rose, you can't take your eyes from her, and you can't help but sympathize.
It is in sleep that everything happens, and an office drone becomes a hero and a warrior. His quest is figuring out how to bring his dream life into his real one.
This is true, exciting storefront theater, set in a literal, narrow storefront on 79th Street in the South Shore neighborhood. It's challenging, passionate, and beautifully in your face.
For the last play he programmed as Goodman's artistic director, Falls chose a masterpiece about change and endings"Anton Chekhov's "The Cherry Orchard."
One of William Shakespeare's earliest plays, "The Comedy of Errors" is sublimely ridiculous.
There are lies told for art and lies told for power. In art, a lie (known as a story), can show what's true. In politics, lies oppress. This play reveals hard truths about fascism's destruct…
Fighting a revolution looks like glorious fun from the outside. On the inside, you see friends die and family members suffer.
"Fen," a revival of a 1983 Caryl Churchhill play, is about women in the rural lowlands of England. But the distant setting in a somewhat distant time doesn't matter, because the conflicts ar…
"Villette" is a new play based on Charlotte Bronte's final novel.
In Lucas Hnath's play "The Christians," the popular pastor of a megachurch tries something truly difficult.
Lookingglass Theatre's "The Steadfast Tin Soldier," which first opened to glowing reviews in 2018, has become a Chicago holiday theater tradition, along with "The Christmas Carol" at the Goo…
"It is impossible to be unhappy while reading the adventures of Jeeves and Wooster," said novelist Christopher Buckley. "And I've tried."
Emily Means Wills has a unique place in Chicago theater. She helps audience members who are blind, or have low vision, experience live theater by describing what's happening on the stage.
What better way to explore the poisonous effects of repression than by making the respectable Jekyll female, with a malignant male Hyde acting out Jekyll's hidden desires?
Kosky did not want a safe "Fiddler." Kosky wanted the big chorus and full orchestra that can only be provided in an opera house. "It's a shtetl. It's a world," Kosky explains. "And it makes …
Babes with Blades Theatre Co., known for its use of stage combat and the casting of women in male roles, explores disability culture and "othering" in its new production of "Richard III."
What a delight it is to sit on the grass and watch this talented, diverse troupe of actors perform one of Shakespeare's most popular and accessible comedies.
"Lookingglass Alice" reveals the beauty in change and unexpected lessons, while acknowledging their pain.
A portrait of a fifteenth-century serial killer that you can both hate and secretly cheer for.