Play List 2011: Top Shows Of The Year

TheatreInChicago presents its annual list of the top-rated plays that were produced in the Chicago area in 2011. The list was compiled objectively from critics' reviews, based on the Highly Recommended to Not Recommended scale.

Somewhat unsurprisingly, 2011 was another good year to be a revival of a classic musical in Chicago. Of the twenty-five plays that.... Read More

Bodily Changes: Playing the Prince in Changes of Heart

How do actors act? We know that it involves memorizing speeches and moving around a stage, but what exactly do they do to convince us that they are somebody they aren't?

There are two fundamental ways to proceed when creating a persona: you can determine the character's psychological orientation and use it as a gateway to understanding their actions—Hamlet.... Read More

Protecting The Force: Star Wars memorabilia in All Childish Things

If the quarry in Joseph Zettelmaier's heist comedy was money, or gold, or diamonds, it would have been no problem—everybody knows that what they see onstage is just gilt paint and glass beads. Ah, but the treasure tempting a quartet of Star Wars fans to the Dark Side in All Childish Things is a warehouse filled with.... Read More

Bombs and Body Parts: Gruesome Gadgets for A Behanding In Spokane

Does Martin McDonagh sit up nights, thinking up extravagant scenic stunts to make the theater technicians who must stage them likewise lose sleep? Scalding fry-pan torture for The Beauty Queen of Leenane. Desiccated human bones smashed with sledge-hammers for A Skull In Connemara. A kitchen stove shotgunned to smithereens for The Lonesome West. Feline corpses and blood-spray shootings.... Read More

Theatre In Chicago's 2011 Holiday Show Round-Up

Chicago is a pretty good place to be for the holidays. We have Christkindlmarket, a wondrously Teutonic market/fairground in Daley Plaza selling all manner of Christmas tree ornaments and ridiculously detailed hand-carved Bavarian wooden clocks. We have Michigan Avenue, lit up and festive and able to provide enough egregious shop-till-you-dropness for even the most insatiable suburbanite or out-of-towner..... Read More

Jeff Awards Announces 2011 Equity Awards Recipients

At the gala 43rd Annual Equity Jeff Awards held at Drury Lane Oakbrook on Monday, November 7, "The Madness of George III," from Chicago Shakespeare Theater, took top honors for a play in the Large Theatre tier with a total of 5 awards, including Production - Play, Director Penny Metropulos and Principal Actor Harry Groener. In musical categories.... Read More

Hold The Liquor: (Fake) Strong Drink in Touch Of The Poet and Old Times

The champion of dramatic binges, we all know, is Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, where for nearly three hours, liquor is swilled in quantities to test the livers of the dramatis personae, and the bladders of the actors who portray them. Whether hearkening to the Dionysic origins of western theater, or simply providing a handy means.... Read More

Sleeping Snug In Tight Spaces: Beds in Becky Shaw (and Other Plays)

Designers confronted with tiny storefront stages cheat all the time—substituting love-seats for sofas, armchairs for loungers, parson's stools for coffee tables—but a bed cannot be easily stretched or squeezed, especially when the play's significant action calls for the hotel-sized variety—a factor presenting no obstruction to the three theater companies this year replicating an array of transient lodging in.... Read More

Painting By The Numbers for The Pitmen Painters

The Pitmen Painters recounts the fortunes of a group of English coal miners who hire a professor through their Workman's Education Association to teach a night-school course in Art Appreciation. When the teacher assigns his pupils the task of making their own art to serve as material for discussion. None of them anticipate a fashionable collector championing.... Read More

How Do Chicago Actors Survive?

Being an actor is akin to being a clown in the circus. You need to get into character for every performance, and juggling is a must for survival. In place of dogs and flying objects on a unicycle, an actor balances multiple bill-paying gigs while chasing down rehearsals, auditions and performance. Both jobs—actor and clown—require a healthy amount.... Read More

Ernie Nolan Drives Eric and Andy Wild!

We all love a good surprise, and none of us deserves a happy one more than the great Ernie Nolan. Ernie has been working hard as the Artistic Director of Emerald City Children's Theatre, directing plays such as the popular Pinkalicious for the Broadway In Chicago collaboration, and writing children's plays. Eric and Andy got a chance to.... Read More

Sweeney Todd: The Bloodless Barber of Fleet Street

Sweeney Todd calls its protagonist "The Demon Barber of Fleet Street"—a fitting sobriquet for the crazed Victorian haircutter who murdered the customers in his chair and delivered their corpses to the pastry shop downstairs to be made into pies (the original "mystery meat"). So what you need to stage this Stephen Sondheim-Hugh Wheeler pop-opera is lots of.... Read More

Chicago gains "Love, Loss And What I Wore" for an extended run

Famed rom-com writer/director Nora Ephron (When Harry Met Sally..., Sleepless In Seattle, etc.) is bringing her Drama Desk Award-winning, critically acclaimed, smash hit Off-Broadway play Love, Loss, and What I Wore to the Broadway Playhouse at Water Tower Place beginning September 14, 2011 for a run that's already been extended six more weeks, through December 4, 2011.

Love,.... Read More

The Women of the Jeffs talk with Eric and Andy

As everyone knows, here in Chicago we celebrate excellence in the theatrical arts with the Joseph Jefferson Awards. The nominations were recently released for the Equity Jeff Awards, and we noticed three young artists that have really made the grade after working in the non-Equity storefront scene for years. Golden throated Bethany Thomas was nominated for Best.... Read More

Jeff Awards Announces 2011 Equity Nominations

The Jeff Awards announced 185 nominations in 35 categories for Chicago Equity theatrical productions which opened between August 1, 2010, and July 31, 2011. The Jeff Awards sent judges to the opening nights of 130 Equity productions offered by 51 producing organizations. From these openings, 100 productions were "Jeff Recommended," which made them eligible for award nominations.
.... Read More

Drury Lane Theatre Announces 2012-2013 Season

Drury Lane Theatre, known for producing acclaimed, innovative and classic musicals and comedies, announced its 2012-2013 season featuring five glorious films brought to new life on stage. The Tony Award-winning phenomenon Hairspray previews April 12, opens April 19 and runs through June 17; the riveting thriller The 39 Steps previews July 5, opens July 12 and.... Read More

Team Colors: Outfitting Sports Fans in Black and Blue

The play's title, Black and Blue, refers to the uniforms worn by Chicago's two baseball teams—black and white for the Sox, Blue and Red for the Cubs—in this world premiere play by Nick Digilio and Anthony Tournis. They are the flags under which brothers Jake and Tommy pledge their respective allegiances. Despite their widower father's attempts to.... Read More

The World According To Quinn

Former Saturday Night Live star and Comedy Central regular Colin Quinn is bringing his one-man comedy show Colin Quinn: Long Story Short to Water Tower Place's Broadway Playhouse for a three-week engagement beginning August 24th. Directed by Jerry Seinfeld, Long Story Short was extended twice on Broadway and was nominated for a Drama Desk Award. It ran.... Read More

Jersey Boys Return to Chicago

Dates have been announced for Chicago's return engagement of the Tony, Grammy and Olivier Award-winning hit musical JERSEY BOYS, the story of Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons. The musical will make its much-anticipated return to Chicago to play the Bank of America Theatre (18 W. Monroe) nine weeks only; April 5 through June 2, 2012.

JERSEY.... Read More

How We Differ: Why Chicago Actors Stand Out

Sweeping Generalizations Alert: This article contains extravagant speculation about the differences between Chicago actors/theaters and their counterparts in Los Angeles and New York City. Sensitive, literal-minded and humorless souls with a preference for nitpicking nuance, factual relativism and reality checks may experience toxic side effects to the broader truths in this playful piece. Consider yourself warned.

So on to.... Read More