News & Reviews Category
Time-Honored Traditions
Fiddler on the Roof
We all could use an evening in the theatre to be entertained, inspired and to escape the merciless heat we’re currently experiencing. And given the current climate of this nation, both politically and meteorologically, a good production of FIDDLER ON THE ROOF is exactly what we need right now. And what we have at Music Theater Works is a great production, filled with new innovations and time-honored Traditions.
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A Fanciful Feel-Good Charmer
Amelie
The walls of Joe Allen’s, one of my favorite restaurants in New York City, are adorned with theatre posters. That’s not unusual for a Broadway eatery, except that the window cards are all from musicals that flopped. If the poster for AMELIE is hanging there it’s because, when it premiered on Broadway five years ago, the musical didn’t do very well. The show only racked up 83 performances before the producers eventually pulled the plug. That’s not what you’d call a smash hit.
Read MoreFlyover in Chicago at Navy Pier
They say the third time is a charm. In this case it’s much more than that.
I spent a beautiful Monday afternoon at Navy Pier with my three grandchildren. We walked around enjoying the summer weather and then headed over to the Flyover. I took my grandson last year when he came to visit and it was one of the most memorable parts of his trip. This time it was his sisters that got to experience the fun.
Read MoreRaccoons and Meditation bring enlightenment in BUDDHA’S BIRTHDAY
BUDDHA’S BIRTHDAY, by award winning playwright Amy Crider, began as a ten-minute play written for a Scene Shop Showcase at Chicago Dramatists in 2014. Crider wrote and expanded her original idea, and Lucid Theater Company debuted it August 2, directed by Iris Sowlat.
Pamela (a nervous and likeable Kristie Berger) is a history professor up for tenure. She’s also planning her mother’s 80th birthday and trying to finish her first book. She’s got a racoon problem in her yard, a leaky roof, and the students at her university are rebelling against the traditional history curriculum. Her husband, Lawrence (a charming Christopher Hainsworth as your favorite college “prof”) a philosophy professor, is doing his best to support her through it all. She does yoga and is a practicing Buddhist, but it’s not helping. Pamela is an anxious mess. It’s affecting every part of her life, and despite her adoring husband and successful career, she is deeply insecure.
As the first act unfolds, Pamela and Lawrence appear to have a loving and solid relationship, though much of their focus is centered on her difficulties getting through any event.
Once Pamela’s mother, Roberta (the delightful Kathleen Ruhl) arrives, the source of Pamela’s raging insecurity is clearer. Ruhl’s Roberta has never held a punch in her life. She has a sharp tongue and a critical eye. She’s also very proud of her other daughter, Ellen, a powerhouse attorney. Crider delivers here with tight, funny, dialogue that is all too familiar to anyone with someone important in their life who only ever seems to notice your flaws. Next is Jennifer (a sweet and sunny Ada Grey), Pamela’s niece, who has flown in for the party after months spent backpacking across the world. The last piece of this family chaos-puzzle is a wily raccoon, who jumps in and out of scenes and creates general havoc, perhaps as a symbol of our inability to truly control anything in this life.
As Pamela strives towards enlightenment, she struggles to connect with each of her family members and her partner, but it’s the relationships between the women that are most interesting. Crider has a keen eye for the complexity inherent in long term and familial relationships. The best part of the show is watching three generations of a family navigate the expectations of each other versus their own personal fulfillment. Ruhl’s Roberta is the definition of a “spitfire” old lady, she’s hilarious, and happily, not my mom. Grey’s Jennifer has a sunny smile and buoyant presence that radiate peace and joy. Her desire to go her own way and easy embrace of self-love highlights her aunt Pamela’s increasingly desperate mind-set, which Berger portrays with a fidgeting, hand wringing intensity. Pamela has spent her whole life desperate for praise and attention from her mother, and it has shaped how much space she allows herself to take up. Pamela’s also spent so much time obsessed with pleasing her mom that she ignores a key conversation with her husband, leading to disastrous results. Luckily, her years of Buddhist practice have left her open to advice from an unexpected source and she finally begins to realize that some of her mother’s narratives that she has accepted without question are utterly wrong.
The text drives towards a confrontation between Pamela and her mother. Her family roots for her, the audience roots for her, and yet, the final act of the play takes an unexpected turn, missing an opportunity. Rather than end with a potentially cathartic confrontation between generations of women, Crider went with a more conventional feminist trope of a woman who cuts herself loose in the span of a moment. Based on the two hours we spent with her, she cut the wrong string, but don’t worry, the raccoon is fine.
Somewhat Recommended
Reviewed by Alina C. Hevia
BUDDHA’S BIRTHDAY runs August 2-17th on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays at 7:30, and Sunday at 3:00 pm, present by Lucid Theater Co. at The Edge Theatre, 5451 N. Broadway.
Tickets: $38 plus applicable fees, on sale at www.lucidtheater.com
Please visit www.lucidtheater.com for more information.
Additional information about this and other area productions can be found by visiting www.theatreinchicago.com.
You Can’t Stop the Beat
Hairspray
Do you wanna forget your troubles and just get happy? Well then hurry over to the Grand Theater in Highland Park High School. Bursting with happy hits, heaps of heart and clouds of hairspray for days, Uptown Music Theater’s Summer production is an entertaining, energetic and infectious confection that absolutely should not be missed! It also delivers a strong, positive message about equality. From the snappy opening number, “Good morning Baltimore,” to the show’s rousing finale so filled with pep that “You Can’t Stop the Beat,” this magnificent, multi Tony Award-winning musical comedy is definitely a crowd pleaser for theatergoers of all ages.
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Losing is Not an Option
Billie Jean
“Champions keep playing until they get it right.” That’s how legendary tennis pro Billie Jean King summed up the initiative and motivation that propelled her life and, in fact, her entire career. Losing is not an option because “Victory is fleeting and losing is forever,” Ms. King quipped during a news interview.
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Opposites Attract
True West
As the lights come up, we find Austin at work on his screenplay, sitting at the kitchen counter of his mother’s clean and tidy house. Through the windows we can see that we’re in the picturesque foothills of Southern California’s San Gabriel Mountains, not far from Lost Angeles. All is calm and orderly, but that’s about to change. Lee, Austin’s resentful and ill-tempered estranged older brother, unexpectedly drops in. Swaddled in dirty, sweat-stained clothing and badly in need of a shower and haircut, Lee is clearly the polar opposite of well-groomed, preppy and highly-educated Austin. But as they say, “Opposites Attract.” And by the final curtain of this dark comedy, the kitchen has turned into a ragged desert landscape, the two brothers seem to have swapped identities and they’ve both become part of the wild, True West.
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Being True to Yourself
Arthur & Friends Make a Musical
At Lakewood Elementary School, Mr. Ratburn’s class is getting ready to write and perform a show for everyone in Elwood City. All of Arthur’s classmates are excited, inspired and busy writing stories that showcase an aspect of each kid’s personality. But Arthur, who most of his friends find boring, needs some creative motivation. After envisioning his buddy Buster’s mystery thriller, his friend Muffy’s fashion forward fantasy, Arthur is inspired by his schoolmate Brain’s dinosaur drama and even swayed his little sister DW’s obsession with extraterrestrial aliens, Arthur tries to write a story that’s equally as exciting.
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A Journey Beyond the Music
Twisted Melodies
When we’re privileged to enjoy the creativity of a talented artist of any kind—visual, musical, theatrical—the public usually has no idea of the struggles that person has endured. The only way we see, hear or know the creator is through his or her art. For most of us, that’s the only way we know the Soul Music Legend Donny Hathaway. But when we become immersed in the complicated world of this talented musical genius, in a show researched, written and performed by Chicago and National super talent, Kelvin Roston, Jr., we are treated to something far more than your typical jukebox musical. We find that we’re listening more closely in a journey beyond the music.
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Passion
I was very excited for Tuesday’s opening of Blank Theatre Company’s production of Stephen Sondheim’s Passion. First, I am an enormous Sondheim fan, and this is on the short list with Pacific Overtures of Sondheim shows I had never seen done live. Second, I absolutely love this theater company and still think about their wonderful productions of She Loves Me and On the Twentieth Century. They seem to have the knack for tackling complicated or rarely produced shows, so I had high hopes and expectations when I sat down. I am happy to report that Blank Theatre has once again knocked it clean out of the park.
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