Chicago Tribune - Highly Recommended
"...One of the great pleasures of the delightfully quirky show known as “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee” is the way it combines musical theater and improvisational comedy. Once a handful of audience members are recruited in the lobby to become spelling bee contestants along with the nerdy kids who make up the misfit characters, the actors go to work writing put-downs. And whoever is fast-tracking the gags backstage at the Marriott Theatre is a very funny writer."
Chicago Sun Times - Highly Recommended
"...Conceived by Rebecca Feldman, and animated by Rachel Sheinkin's wholly ingenious Tony Award-winning book and a punchy, high-spirited score by William Finn, the Marriott production has been directed and choreographed by Rachel Rockwell, who shows every sign of becoming the Susan Stroman of Chicago. Her in-the-round staging here is seamless, and her shrewd casting ensures that a winning dramatic intensity supports the broad cartoonishness."
Daily Herald - Highly Recommended
"...Musically, the production is a delight thanks to Peck's seasoned singers - an ensemble whose grand sound contradicts its small number. They manage to sound like children, without ever coming across as contrived, which itself is no small accomplishment. Ultimately, "Spelling Bee" owes its singular charm to whimsy and insight - a truly winning combination."
Chicago Reader - Somewhat Recommended
"...Adapted from an improv-based play, William Finn and Rachel Sheinkin's musical retains a loose, fresh, spontaneous feel that comes across in director Rachel Rockwell's Marriott Theatre revival. But the material begins to feel a little thin after a while, partly because the characters are treated as little more than comic stereotypes and partly because Finn's lyrics are bland and his music forgettable."
Windy City Times - Highly Recommended
"...Directed by Rachel Rockwell, this is a production that's touching without being saccharine or precious. It's also as irreverently, scarifyingly berserk as only adolescence can be. And, finally, it manages to be both good-natured and bizarrely, hilariously twisted as it sends up Stepford-smiling real-estate queens, juicebox-toting ex-cons and vice principals thisclose to unleashing their inner psychopaths. In all, it's a hoot. We've now seen Spelling Bee (when it ran for months at the Drury Lane, Water Tower Place) at least four times, and darn if the show doesn't still make us smile."
EpochTimes - Highly Recommended
"...Over the years, the press releases and ads for "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" have read "Can you spell H-I-L-A-R-I-O-U-S ?" to get people in the mood for a fun time at the theater- guess what? It is! And to make it even better Marriott Theatre in Lincolnshire's production is one glorious laugh-filled theatrical experience. Anyone who doesn't have a good time at this one is either D-E-A-D or needs immediate attention. Directed and choreographed by Rachel Rockwell this in the round production is filled with some of the areas most talented actors ( who can sing and dance to boot) and from the very onset, it is one laugh after another with some great H-O-O-T-S in between."
Copley News Service - Highly Recommended
"...The production is a perfect fit for the Marriott’s intimate in-the-round stage under the guidance of director/choreographer Rachel Rockwell. The ensemble may be too old for their student characters but where are you going to find teen-age performers who can sing, dance, and act as well as the mature cast at the Marriott?"
Centerstage - Highly Recommended
"...one might dismiss The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee as nothing much — who wants to see pubescent kids struggle through a spelling bee and sing about it? Well, the doubters are wrong: the show is utterly hilarious, surprisingly warm, and almost criminally entertaining."
ChicagoCritic - Highly Recommended
"...These misfits are so human, so like us, that we cheer for each. The bizarre words selected together with the wacky definitions and sentence usage examples by playwright Rachel Sheinkin add to the laughs. The cast seems to be having as much fun as the audience as the connection between them is electric. This is a most audience friendly show. You’ll laugh plenty. Spelling Bee spells H-I-T."
Chicago Stage and Screen - Highly Recommended
"...Can you spell H-I-L-A-R-I-T-Y? If not, you should book a ticket immediately to "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee". The surprise Broadway hit musical, conceived by Rebecca Feldman with a book by Rachel Sheinkin and score by William Finn, made its Chicago debut three years ago in a Broadway in Chicago sit-down run at Drury Lane Water Tower Theatre, and it's still the funniest show in town in the breezy new production at the Marriott Theatre in Lincolnshire. In fact, with the present cast it is now as confident musically as it is in the book department."
