Savoring Theater in Chicago, Summer 2015

DBH, his sister, Norah and I gorged on luscious theater this summer in Chicago.  Here’s a rundown on our outings. 

The Drowning Girls 

May 31st – The Drowning Girls at Signal Theater Ensemble.  Turn of the 20th century, three women, all murdered by George Joseph Smith, all in the bathtub.  Water, water everywhere in this innovatively staged one act play.

June 12 – The Birds – Dramatization of Daphne du Maurier’s short story.  Could have been truly frightening, but lacked sustained suspense.

June 26 – Christopher Durang’s Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike at The Goodman.  Based somewhat on The Cherry Orchard, the play featured excellent actors working an often banal script.  

June 28 – Bad Jews produced by Theater Wit.  7/8 of this play was tight, funny and featured outstanding performances.  The ending was maudlin and disappointing.  

All Our Tragic

July 4th – All Our Tragic – We celebrated the 4th by seeing for the 2nd time the 12 hour extravaganza produced by The Hypocrites.  Perhaps even better than the first time, we thrilled at revisiting the surviving 32 Greek plays smashed into a slam bang tale of lust, greed, death, spells and laughter.  Significant improvements made to the production, but the ending still a bit shallow. 

A Little Business at the Big Top

July 12 – Physical Theater Festival – Saw a Spanish duo present Popal is Gone and a solo performance by David Gaines of A Little Business at the Big Top.  Amazing theater.  Put this festival on your list for next year.  The performances were first rate and I think we paid $15 for tickets.  

July 26 – Man and Superman by George Bernard Shaw – Ok, this is cheat.  I saw this fabulous production courtesy of the National Theater Live, broadcast to the Music Box Theater.  Ralph Fiennes was amazing.  Indira Varma was luscious and smart.  The production was amazing.  Thank you National Theater for bringing exceptional productions to such a large audience.  

August 15 – Brilliant Adventures at the Steep Theater.  Much like we discovered the Hypocrites in 2014, this year our discovery is Steep Theater.  They specialize in new, edgy plays, mostly from the UK.  The ensemble members are "steeped" in the Steppenwolf tradition of trauma in drama, which we love.  Brilliant Adventures is an interesting play about time travel – not great, but the acting was exceptional.  

American Idiot

August 30 – American Idiot produced by The Hypocrites.  A rock musical featuring the songs of Green Day, performed at the Den Theater on Milwaukee Avenue.  It looked like the locals took over the stage, as Milwaukee Avenue is a mash-up of homeless, helpless, hot spots.  Lots of rocking by amazing cast, but the effort lacked a soul.  I have never even heard of Green Day, much less their music.

Sideshow

Sept. 13 – Sideshow – musical at Porchlight Theater.  Story of Siamese twins, Daisy and Violet Hilton who try to make it in show business.  First act like a Disney musical.  Second act like a Sondheim musical.  We love Porchlight, but the first act needs work.

Sept. 27 – Disgraced at The Goodman – Pulitzer Prize winner by Ayad Akhtar.  Everyone has the opportunity to play the race or religion card in this play.  Supposed to be a great conversation starter for theater goers, but we agreed that there is no escaping race as a part of our national gestalt.  What matters is how you behave.

Lucio Silla

Sept. 30 – Chicago Opera Theater – Mozart’s first opera, Lucio Silla.  You can’t beat the Chicago Opera Theater for dramatic, economical staging.  About 20 members of the Apollo Chorus appeared on stage in what can only be described as, “Wear whatever’s comfortable, so long as it’s pants, long sleeved shirt, black, and casual.”  But it fit in with the sparse staging that used lighting to make the drama work.  Four sopranos, two in trouser roles and one tenor.  All magnificent voices.  Glad they are spending money on the right things.  Well, it was early Mozart, cut from six hours to two and a half.  Lots of trilling and repetition.  I enjoyed it as a “period piece”, but was ever so pleased that we did not have to witness all six hours. 

The Cheats

October 2nd – Steep Theater world premiere of Hamish Linklater’s The Cheats.  Intense and unsettling from the first words.  Moral of the play: be careful what you choose to share about your personal dark side.  This ensemble is definitely “Son of Steppenwolf” – complete with a fistfight.  We love it.  Excellent acting and a well-crafted play.  

We're ready to dive into the Tucson theater scene - yes, there really is one.  First up, Saint Joan by Shaw.  

Orgy at the end

DBH and I leave for Tucson in a week – so we decided to go out in a blaze of Chicago theatrical glory.  Three very different experiences: Macbeth, All Our Tragic and The Whaleship Essex.

Nmon Ford

Macbeth, the opera version by Ernest Bloch, and staged by Chicago Opera Theater, is a rather lugubrious 1904 version of the Scots tragedy, totally saved by Sean T. Cawelti, the Video Designer.   Not that there were not great moments of opera:  Nmon Ford as Macbeth was both eye and ear candy.  We will see more of him in larger opera venues.  The few minutes of chorus time were splendid.  98% of the score was quasi-modern atonal, but the chorus was robust and alive with late 19th century tonality and lots of major and minor chords.  

Table with video above

Sean T. Cawelti transformed the huge box of the Harris Theater into a stage framed with integrated video action.  The three witches (here zaftig, young women) aimed video camera at their faces and bodies, producing huge close-up projected videos over the stage, which often featured other action.  (The viewing challenge was not unlike attending an NBA game and finding yourself focusing on the video screens rather than the live action.) The only furnishings on the stage were a 25 x 6 table on which most of the action centered – and a few plain gray chairs.  Video directly over the table doubled the action.  Video at the corners transported the featured singer into swirls of mirror images, almost seeming to reveal the inner mind.  How does Mr. Cawelti do it?  Who knows, but he is magical.  In our previous Chicago Opera Theater production, he designed the shadow puppets and video elements.  Again, a significant enhancement to the theatrical experience.  www.seancawelti.com

Survivors in their "whalers"

The Whaleship Essex, produced by Shattered Globe Theatre, and written by ensemble member, Joe Forbrich, is based on the book, The Wreck of the Whaleship Essex.  This book was originally published in 1821 and written by First Mate Owen Chase just months after he returned home to Nantucket. It is the basis for Hermann Melville Moby Dick.  The theater version includes 15 crew members that move from naïve land-lubbers to seasoned crew to dying survivors after a whale rams and sinks their ship.  Survivors travel 2000 miles in three whalers.  Most died and were eaten by the rest.  No rainbows and unicorns in this story.  Overall, well done, well-staged.  I particularly enjoyed the sea chanties and spirituals that tied the story together.

Helen of Troy and her daughter, Hermione

Then there is All Our Tragic – 12 hours in the theater.  Yes, you read right, 12 hours.  We arrived about 10:30 A.M. to be there when the doors opened to obtain prime seats.  And we really didn’t leave the theater until 11:15 in the evening.  The event combines the 22 surviving Greek tragedies (Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides) into a single 12-hour epic.  We loved it.  This is “balls out”, “think no small thoughts” theater.  What you expect in Chicago.  14 actors each played three roles and it seemed that many were in all the episodes, but that would be impossible.  Still the pages of lines memorized and characters inhabited are staggering.  Several things noted:
* 90% of the attendees were under 40 – Chicago is a young theater town.
* The producing company, The Hypocrites, gets it.  Everything was perfectly handled from comfortable chairs, to restrooms cleaned, to lots of food, to a totally engaged and accommodating staff.  We were left with nothing to complain about…
* We don’t know nearly enough about the Greek tragedies.  Yes, we will reread them and enjoy them more than ever.

So we depart Chicago infused with the great cultural life and look forward to Tucson where the thoughts are not so large nor the productions so daring.  But we anticipate fun at the local theater and frequent visits to the cinema for the Metropolitan Opera Live broadcasts.  

Mad Men - the musical...

DBH and I caught the preview of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying at the Porchlight Music Theater in Chicago.  We'd both seen the original production in the early '60s with Robert Morse, Rudy Vallee and Charles Nelson Riley.  And we still enjoy rewatching the movie with Robert Morse and Rudy Vallee. 

Mr. Biggley and J. Pierpont Finch

Porchlight's production was fun, exuberant and malicious.  Just as you would expect if Mad Men was made into a musical comedy.  Everything is played over the top, with songs that had the audience standing and singing along as The Brotherhood of Man wrapped up the performance.  If you follow this blog, you know that musical theater, especially produced in small venues is a favorite of mine.  How to Succeed was produced in a theater seating at most 150, with a thrust stage, so we were wrapped around the actors. 

Rosemary and Finchy

My only nagging comment concerns miking the performers.  The horns and woodwinds, which were also miked, were consistently above the singers.  And to fix the problem, it appeared that the sound designed just made both louder...This is a very small theater.  I would love to hear the production with no mikes, or with sound designed by a technician who understands that louder is usually not better.  

Yummmmmm, this fall Porchlight is mounting Sweeney Todd.  Can't wait to see the bodies fall into the basement and the pies go into the oven while Mrs. Lovett and Toby sing God, That's Good.

Come to the Cabaret

How many times can you see Cabaret and still enjoy it?  DBH and I still trying to find that out.  Whether the movie version, or live, it is one of the great musicals of the 20th century.  Last Sunday we fell in love all over again with the Chicago Light Opera Works production, starring their Artistic Director, Rudy Hogamiller as the Emcee.  He was more than significantly malicious and a great singer and dancer.  Rudy danced in the chorus of Cabaret on Broadway.  The version of the show we saw was the original, with the secondary romance built around the older owner of the boarding house, Fraulein Schneider and the Jewish fruit shop owner, Herr Schultz. 

I don't mean to slight Jenny Lamb who was a great Sally Bowles.  And, without seeming like a fashionista, we wore the magnificent costumes designed by Jesus Perez with aplomb.  Lots of mid 30's style flowing chiffon and bias cut dresses. 

Manys the night we reach into our video collection (yes we keep a video player because we have so many) and pull out Cabaret with Joel Gray and Lisa Minnelli.  It never grows old.  Who could forget the gorgeous Marisa Berenson as Natalia Landauer and Michael York as Brian Roberts.  In the movie, the secondary romance is changed to a German/Jewish conflict featuring a young couple, Natalia and Fritz Wandel, which is resolved with Fritz discovers he is Jewish - and they flee Germany together with her Daddy's millions.  They are so beautiful to watch, but the romance of the older couple, which ends with them separating, is much more poignant and true to the Jewish/Nazi strife. 

Where the movie triumphs over the stage is the rendering of Nazi anthem, Tomorrow Belongs to Me.  In the CLOW version we saw, the song is first introduced by waiters at the Kit Kat Club.  Then at the end of the first act, it is reprised with all the singers and dancers at the engagement party of Frau Kost and Herr Schultz, turning a happy time into tragedy.  In the movie, a very blonde Hitler Youth member stands in bier garten  and sings the anthem in a clear boy tenor voice, solo at first, but then with all the customers joining and tilting the emotional movement towards the coming tragedy, both for Sally and Brian and for Germany. 

While enjoying Cabaret, thoughts flooded over me of how the current situation in Egypt is reflective of German history.  How could the Egyptians elect ultra-conservative Muslims who then elected a member of the Muslim Brotherhood as president, and not expect that they would attempt to establish Sharia law?  And how could they expect that people who give not a whit for the trials and tribulations of anyone except their conservative Muslim allies is going to pull Egypt out of its economic downward spiral?  The fall-off in tourism alone has a domino effect throughout their fragile economy.  And the Copts?  It won't be long before this prosperous segment of the population has fled the country entirely, if they can get out.  Like the Jews, they are a handy whipping-boy for whatever ails the Muslims.  I've advocated before that the US should just open its borders to all Christians in the Middle East.  They surely pass the persecution criteria we set for political asylum. 

So, the next time you want to see a great movie/play about the decline and fall of a country while the citizens dance and sing it up, see Cabaret.  You will leave the theater full of music and thoughtful sadness.   

Three princes, an unfulfilled promise and an unexpected pleasure

DBH and I have been hanging around theaters in Chicago again.  Even in the summer, there is much to be seen and admired.  Now that we have senior CTA passes (1/2 fare) and the street parking fees have doubled ($4 an hour in the "off-loop" area where theaters would be and a 2 hour maximum), we CTA to just about venues.  

First the princes.  Blood and Gifts by J. T. Rogers presented by TimeLine Theater Company focuses on US, Afghan and British political scheming between 1981 and 1991.  It's the story of "blowback" or the law of unintended consequences.  All the good intentions of the US and cynical facilitating of the British left the Afghans well armed militant Islamists.  The script is tight and TimeLine delivered a flawless performance.

Death and Harry Houdini, written by Nathan Allan and presented by the House Theater of Chicago, leaves you breathless.  OK, it's a magic show.  But the theater seats about 100 people, so you are literally on top of the performers.  And, they do all the big Houdini stunts.  Ensemble member Dennis Watkins has been performing as Houdini since 2001, so this production has had plenty of time to mature.  Watkins saws a man in half, eats and disgorges razor blades, performs card tricks, magic hat slight of hand and even the famous water torture cell.  What a show for children - they can even learn a bit about immigrant German Jews.

Belleville, written by Amy Hertzog and produced by Steppenwolf, fits the full Steppenwolf criteria - screams, blood, nudity and good drama.  Amy was crafty in constructing this play; four actors, a white couple and a black couple, and one set, so fairly inexpensive to produce.  Best of all, the good guys are the blacks and the baddies (or saddies) are the whites.  What more could American theater goers ask for?  It's also one act which is appealing now that getting eight hours horizontal is important.  It's no August, Osage County, but good theater. 

The unfulfilled promise is The Jungle Book, written and directed by Mary Zimmerman and produced at The Goodman Theater.  This play is funded by Disney.  They are looking for another hit for their Broadway theater.  Last February, I applauded and cried at the end of Zimmerman's Metamorphoses, one of my most memorable theater experiences.  Jungle Book just leaves you wanting a story to wrap around the music, most of which comes from the Disney animated movie.  The song and dance numbers are fun and pulsating, colorful and entrancing.  The costumes are splendid; the character actors (snake, tiger, bear) are perfect.  There is just no heart.  Even the boy playing Mowgli was well cast, naive and believable.  I've just downloaded the two books of The Jungle Book and plan to read them in Peru.  I hope Mary Zimmerman is doing the same.  The play goes from here to Boston and supposedly there will be considerable rework before opening there.

Another aspect of The Jungle Book that left me perturbed is the use of African-American jazz and swing music.  It's all from the Disney movie and beautifully performed, but this is the Indian jungle, not African.  So when Andre DeShields' showstopping King Louie, the head of the monkey pack, singsI Want to Be Like You, meaning like a man, I wondered, "Will someone play the race card over this?".  But I didn't really feel the same way about Kevin Carolan who played a overweight, intellectually challenged Baloo the Bear, though some doughy white men might.  I'd like to see some African-American theater goers weight in on this. 

Finally, an unexpected pleasure.  DBH and I are author  Salman Rushdie fans.  We plow through the good, bad and in-between because he is so imaginative and we always learn about more about Indian culture.  Midnight's Children is Rushdie's seminal work about the independence of India, the separation of India from Pakistan and Pakistan from Bangladesh.  Magical realism is not my favorite genre, but it serves the plot well.  And, the history of India's birth and development is hardly realistic anyway.   Well, they made a movie of it!  And it isn't awful.  The first half swept me back to the book and the great story of children born at the stroke of midnight when India was granted independence from Great Britain - all of whom can magically communicate with one another.  The balance of the movie deals mostly with the devastation of the subsequent wars - not an easy history lesson to condense into less than an hour. 

If you really want to dip into Rushdie, try The Satanic Verses, the book for which the Ayatollah of Iran put a fatwa on Rushdie and forced him into hiding for many years.