Archive for May, 2009
Sunday Night Sondheim: Donna McKechnie sings “Tick Tock” from “Company” (1993)
“Tick Tock” from Company (1993)
Donna McKechnie recreates (in a shortened form) her “Tick Tock” dance, choreographed by Michael Bennett, for a Company reunion concert in 1993.
Company, with a book by George Furth and music/lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, debuted on Broadway on April 26, 1970. It was among the first musicals to deal with adult problems throughout its story and music.
Timeline Theatre Announces 2009-2010 Season
TIMELINE THEATRE COMPANY
ANNOUNCES 2009-10 SEASON
ALL MY SONS
by Arthur Miller
directed by Kimberly Senior
August 31 – October 4, 2009 (previews 8/27 – 8/30)
Praised along with Death of a Salesman and The Crucible as Miller’s masterpieces, this 1947 Tony Award winner for Best Play returns to the Chicago stage for the first time since an acclaimed Broadway revival last season. A middle-class American family struggles to deal with the loss of one son during World War II and the desire of another son to now marry his brother’s fiancé. As family members and those closest to them try to move forward, an explosive secret from the father’s past threatens to unravel everyone’s hopes for happiness. This powerful drama is a haunting exploration of business ethics and one’s moral responsibility to the larger community.
WHEN SHE DANCED
by Martin Sherman
directed by Nick Bowling
Travel to the Paris of 1923 for this gorgeous and incredibly funny portrait of legendary dancer Isadora Duncan. The so-called mother of modern dance is desperate to keep herself financially solvent and to realize her dream for retirement: a school in Italy to teach young dancers her art. Through a multi-lingual script of great heart and appeal, Sherman mixes the high comedy of a colorful cast of characters with a poignant view of the importance of the arts to move and inspire us. Through the eyes of those in Duncan’s life we glimpse her greatness and how she touched so many lives when she danced.
‘MASTER HAROLD’ … AND THE BOYS
by Athol Fugard
directed by Jonathan Wilson
Recipient of a Drama Desk Award and a Tony Award nomination for Best Play in 1982, ’Master Harold’ … and the Boys is considered Athol Fugard’s masterpiece, valued for both its universal themes of humanity and its skilled theater craft. Set in South Africa during the 1950s era of apartheid, it depicts how institutionalized racism can become absorbed by those who live under it. A white 17-year-old spends time with two African workers he has known all his life, and through their conversations on one rainy day we see what unites and divides them. The play’s beautiful and haunting dialogue and message of hope also inspire the recognition that there is much work to be done to bring people of different races together.
THE FARNSWORTH INVENTION
Chicago premiere
by Aaron Sorkin
directed by Nick Bowling
From the creator of A Few Good Men and The West Wing comes this fascinating new play direct from Broadway. It’s the story of two ambitious visionaries — Philo T. Farnsworth, an Idaho farmboy, and David Sarnoff, head of RCA — battling each other for the rights to one of the greatest inventions of all time: the television. Through corporate espionage, family tragedy, financial disaster and the thrill of discovery, these two larger-than-life men compete for fame and credit and become part of a decision that would change America, and eventually the world.
A fourth play and the season’s schedule are still to be announced.
Says TimeLine Artistic Director PJ Powers:
“We have put together a season filled with bold ideas and tremendous heart and hope and guts. Through a steadfast commitment to our mission, TimeLine aspires to be a place for people to come together, to feel a sense of community and to engage in a dialogue about our place in history. The work on our stage allows audiences to lose themselves in a story from the past in order to perhaps better understand where we are today and where we might go tomorrow. During our 2009-10 season, we look forward to exploring some defining moments of the 20th Century together — moments of art and beauty, of friendship and understanding, and of innovation and exploration.”
Creative team biographies after the fold.
Review: Lifeline’s “Busman’s Honeymoon”
The mystery stew of Busman’s Honeymoon
review by Paige Listerud
Fans of the Lord Peter Wimsey mystery series, by Dorothy L. Sayers, are sure to be delighted by the well-produced world premiere of Busman’s Honeymoon, adapted by Frances Limoncelli and directed by Paul S. Holmquist, both Jeff Award-winning ensemble members of Lifeline Theatre. This is the fourth in a line of Sayer’s Wimsey novels that Limoncelli has adapted for the stage at Lifeline; preceded by Gaudy Night in 2006, Strong Poison in 2004, and Whose Body in 2002. Peter Greenberg and Jenifer Tyler respectively reprise their roles as Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane from Gaudy Night, for which they both received Jeff nominations.
Famous crime sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey and equally famous mystery novelist Harriet Vane escape the glare of publicity by eloping to their newly-purchased English country house. There, with the aid of Lord Wimsey’s long-suffering, perfectionist butler, Bunter, they amiably manage the blighted amenities of their run-down home and the intrusions of eccentric locals on their honeymoon, until murder disturbs everyone’s peace. Embroiling themselves in the mystery threatens their relationship, as much as the crime and their celebrity disrupt the English countryside.
This production is filled with nostalgia, not just for Sayers’ characters in particular, but also for all those crime-solving couples from the Golden Age of Hollywood. Elegant pairings of men and women who are just as likely to toss off a witticism as detect an overlooked clue, all while keeping the romance between them frothy and bubbling. Limoncelli’s adaptation, in accordance with Sayers’ novel, attempts to take Lord and Lady Wimsey to deeper levels. They struggle with intimacy, with keeping their integrity, with staying together while forces pull them apart, and withstand the darkness of bringing someone to execution, according with the law of the land.
There is much here that fans, familiar with both Sayers’ books and/or Lifeline’s series of adaptations, will thoroughly enjoy. The scenes of the rapacious press on Wimsey’s heels are fun and precise in their execution. The scene of the villagers bursting into song creates a much-needed sense of community. The vicar with his blunderbuss is a riot. The rant that Bunter (Phil Timberlake) breaks into over the disturbance of his lord’s delicate port is precious, as is the enmity that it sets up between him and Mrs. Ruddle (Millicent Hurley) from thereon.
People unfamiliar with this series will find enough that detracts from the complete enjoyment of the play, despite the yeoman-like work of the cast and crew.
It takes a deft hand, in writing or in acting, to shift from clever, lighthearted sleuthing to more serious melodrama without a hitch. The challenge is always to create a seamless whole in the characters’ progression, while building and maintaining suspense in resolving the murder.
Here is where one threatens to overweigh the other. Here is when the necessary introduction of stock mystery characters threatens to distract from the deeper development of the central love relationship on stage. Here is where one wonders whether too much is being crushed into an already 21/2 hour-long production. Here one questions whether another form, similar to a mystery television series, would better serve.
What cannot be fulfilled through the structure of the play must be carried by the actor’s performances. Let it just be said that, across the board, these are stock provincial English characters. It is harder to play a stock character than one realistically written. So much of the actor’s performance relies on what is not contained in the script, which is by nature stereotypical, at least in such a predictable genre as mystery. The actor must make three-dimensional a two-dimensional and cliché figure, yet not exceed the boundaries of the character.
Still, these characters must be inhabited in order to keep them from seeming predictable or trite. While the entire cast is technically excellent and uniformly pulls off dialect, character intentions, and complex scene changes with aplomb, nothing replaces the performance that makes one believe that an actor is the gardener, is the jilted old maid, is the vicar, etc.
It’s very possible that in the course of the run each of the cast members will grow deeper connections to their characters and make them seem less superficial. It’s also quite likely that Greenberg and Tyler will better negotiate their characters’ shift between sleuthing with elegant charm to the graver, more precarious pursuit of truth and love.
Rating: «««
Info: Previews beginning Friday, May 1, 2009, opening Monday, May 11, 2009, and running until June 21, 2009. Lifeline Theatre is located at 6912 N. Glenwood Ave. Chicago, IL 60626. For tickets call the box office at 773-761-4477 or visit www.lifelinetheatre.com. Photos by Suzanne Plunkett.
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Chicago Theater Openings this week
ADULTS - Chemically Imbalanced Theater
BURIED CHILD - Shattered Globe Theatre
EIFMAN BALLET OF ST. PETERSBURG – Auditorium Theatre
LEGALLY BLONDE THE MUSICAL - Ford Center for the Performing Arts/Oriental Theatre
MEASURE FOR MEASURE – Promethean Theatre Ensemble
ON AN AVERAGE DAY - BackStage Theatre Company
OWEN WINGRAVE – Chicago Opera Theater
THE PIANO LESSON - Court Theatre
TOMMY – Circle Theatre
THE WALLS - Rivendell Theatre Ensemble
For special ticket offers, click on “Read more”
In honor of opening night of “Legally Blonde”
Review: Goodman Theatre’s “Rock ‘n’ Roll” – triumphantly captivating and celebratory
Goodman Theatre molds Tom Stoppard’s harrowing play into an incredibly human package
Review by Barry Eitel
If anyone knows about the transitive power of music, it would be the Czechs. In 1989, the oppressive Communist government of Czechoslovakia was peacefully overthrown in the “Velvet Revolution,” termed after the band The Velvet Underground. The subversive yet inspiring properties of rock music played a major role in bringing democracy to the country.
In his newest play, Rock ‘n’ Roll, produced by the Goodman Theatre, Tom Stoppard depicts the events leading up to the Velvet Revolution. The play begins amid Soviet tanks rolling into Prague to switch out the progressive government, ending the reformative “Prague Spring” of 1968. However, the play does far more than document Czech history; winding over twenty-two turbulent years, Stoppard intertwines the lives of characters that span different nations, political systems, generations, and ideologies. The Chicago premier of the play, directed by the inspired Charles Newell, stuffs all of the love, loss, and intense intellectual debate into an incredibly human package. And with the best soundtrack on-stage right now, the Goodman production leaves plenty of room for a little rock and roll along the way.
Set designer John Culbert transformed the massive Albert Stage into a concert venue, complete with scaffolding and speakers so massive they could make every ear in the audience bleed. The colossal scale of the set matches the epic tone of the play, which can move thousands of miles from scene to scene. In order to switch from location to location quickly, furniture on platforms is rolled out from the wings and sometimes huge pieces are dropped from the flies. Christopher Akerlind’s lighting design accentuates Culbert’s set smartly. All of the design melds brilliantly together—the space seems more like a Bonnaroo stage than the Goodman theatre.
Timothy Edward Kane is an expressive, vivacious Jan, the Czech doctor of philosophy/rock’n’roll fanatic that the play follows. Kane’s performance captures all of the forces tugging at Jan’s psyche as he attempts to balance his ideals, his relationships with those around him, and his harsh reality under the suppressive regime. Perhaps most importantly, Kane bursts with Jan’s intense passion for music. As Jan’s mentor in Marxism, Max, Stephen Yoakam is fiery. It is heart-wrenching to watch as he clutches to obsolete ideologies as his English world, including his family, abandons them as the Cold War thaws. Another stand-out performance is Goodman veteran Mary Beth Fisher, who plays Max’s wife Eleanor and, twenty years later, his daughter Esme. She differentiates and contrasts the generational gap clearly, as well as having some of the most emotional intense moments in the production.
Newell nails the theatricality of Stoppard’s play, punching up the classic rock world as much as possible. He uses a mysterious piper (a limber Greg Matthew Anderson) to string the story together, having him weave himself among the scaffolding. The “enlightened” Esme confuses the Robert Smith look-a-like for the god Pan. It turns out the ghostly figure might be Pink Floyd’s estranged frontman, Syd Barrett. But the piper maintains a spritely aspect about him, staying eternally young as everyone else ages. This is just one of many examples of how the production captures the imagination instead of sticking inside realistic world. Newell’s daring stylistic choices really pay off, keeping the play exciting while also preserving the human struggle.
Like most Stoppard, the play is highly intellectual and not for everybody, and occasionally the pace slackens during the debates. But even if you don’t understand the Sappho references or Socialist theory, the vibrant relationships linking the characters are still extremely powerful. The captivating language also maintains a tight grip on the audience, even if some of the content requires a masters degree.
This is arguably Stoppard’s finest work, and the Goodman’s production celebrates both the rock spectacle and the inspiring humanity of the story. The audience is left reminded that our world is constantly warping and flowing, like a deep ocean of ideas, cultures, and human connections.
Rating: ««««
Video:
- Stoppard’s Rock ‘n’ Roll on stage
- A Backstage Pass to Rock ‘n’ Roll (Director Charles Newell and the cast talk about Tom Stoppard’s newest play, Rock ‘n’ Roll.)
Below: Stark differences between “Prague Spring” and the “Velvet Revolution”
On the left – Molotov Cocktails thrown during the bloody Prague Spring uprising. On the right, flowers (given to policemen) are used in the peaceful overthrow of the Czech/Soviet Republic in what is now known as the “Velvet Revolution”
Review: “The Lieutenant of Inishmore” (Northlight)
Leave it to Martin McDonagh to find the humor in terrorism.
The Irish playwright is infamous for the intense violence and large quantity of blood in his plays. In The Lieutenant of Inishmore he satirizes the constantly splintering Irish terrorist groups that infested Ireland in the 20th Century. The current production at Northlight Theatre exploits the gruesome spectacle of the play, splashing the stage with blood, brains, and plenty of other body parts.
The play evokes both Quentin Tarantino and John M. Synge. McDonagh exposes the Ireland tourists aren’t familiar with, steeped in ancient traditions and convulsed by political conflict. The lieutenant of Inishmore is Padraic (Cliff Chamberlain), a crazed Irish terrorist considered too bloodthirsty for the IRA. The play begins when the men responsible for cat-sitting Padraic’s furry friend find Wee Thomas squashed on the side of the road. While those with a dead cat on their hands try to figure out how to break the news, other “patriots” enter Inishmore, and the body count slowly increases.
McDonagh had a hard time finding someone to produce the play originally; many theatres found it too controversial. It has become one of his most successful plays to date, and director BJ Jones (who has also directed McDonagh’s A Skull in Connemara and The Cripple of Innishmaan) nails the Chicago premier of the dark comedy. The success of this production would not be possible, however, without special effects designer Steve Tolin, brought in from Pittsburgh. He presents a myriad of different ways to make blood spray and spurt from the actor’s bodies; it’s not often that the gore of a slasher flick is recreated on-stage.
Cliff Chamberlain is excellent as the bloodthirsty Padraic, balancing the craziness of a killer with the tenderness of man who loves his cats. Kelly O’Sullivan plays well against Chamberlain as Mairead, a 16-year-old fan-girl of Padraic and accurate shot with an air rifle. The funniest two of the show, though, is the duo stuck with the dead cat, the long-haired Davey (Jamie Abelson) and Padraic’s father, Donny (Matt DeCaro). The pair takes awhile to connect, but once they find it they are hilarious. John Judd, Andy Luther, and Keith Gallagher are menacing as a trio of Irish hitmen looking for Padraic. By the second act, the whole ensemble clicks together and the outcome is bloody and wickedly funny.
Jones and his team do a very precise job in finding the inherent comedy in the violence. The amount of bloodshed in the play is ridiculous, and the characters’ reasoning behind it is bizarre. With the help of Tolin and fight choreographer Nick Sandys, Jones arranges scenes that show the folly of extremist violence. And by committing to the dangerous reality the script presents, the cast can be comical while making the audience believe that they have real guns with real bullets.
McDonagh wrote the play in response to some very non-comical real events. In February, 1993, an English gas company was bombed, killing and wounding soldiers, civilians, and several children. As Americans, we have plenty of experience with the horrors of terrorism. By pointing out the ridiculousness of extremist beliefs, the play is incredibly relevant to our 21st Century world. And even though “the Troubles” in Ireland have calmed down since the 1990’s, terrorism is still alive there. In March, IRA dissidents assassinated several English soldiers near Belfast as they went to get pizza. The events depicted in Lieutenant of Inishmore are not as outlandish as they might seem at first glance.
Rating: «««½
Cast and artistic team rosters, including bios, can be found after the fold.
To see videos of this production, click here.
‘Wizard of Oz’ Munchkin, Mickey Carroll, dies at 89
One of the last surviving Munchkins, Mickey Carroll, from the 1939 beloved film "The Wizard of Oz," died Thursday at the young-in-heart age of 89. Caretaker Linda Dodge said Carroll died in his sleep at her home in suburban Crestwood due to heart problems.
Carroll was one of more than 100 adults and children who were recruited to play the movie natives of what author L. Frank Baum called Munchkin Country in his 1900 book "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz." "The Wizard of Oz" was Carroll’s only movie. When it appeared on television in the 1960s, he found a new career at charitable events, retail events and Oz-related events.
"It’s not me; it’s the movie," Carroll said. "When they see me, they think of their childhood, and it makes them smile."
Carroll told The Associated Press in a 2007 interview that the Munchkins made only $125 a week while filming the movie that would become a classic.
A pituitary condition caused Carroll’s short stature.
Carroll danced at the Muny Theater in St. Louis when he was in grade school, he once said, and in the 1920s worked in Chicago clubs and on the Orpheum Theater vaudeville circuit.
Carroll played the part of the Munchkinland "Town Crier," marched as a "Munchkin Soldier" and was the candy-striped "Fiddler" who escorted the movie’s wide-eyed orphan, Dorothy Gale, played by Judy Garland, down the yellow brick road toward Emerald City.
In November 2007, Carroll and six other surviving Munchkins received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Carroll was joined on that occasion by former Munchkin colleagues Ruth Duccini, Jerry Maren, Margaret Pellegrini, Meinhardt Raabe, Karl Slover and Clarence Swensen. (Swensen died in February 2009)
At a special screening of the film in 2005 in Los Angeles, Carroll said talking to longtime fans about the movie brought back their childhoods.
"They have tears," he said. "I’ll say, `May the magic of Oz always be with you.’ And, `Follow the yellow brick road!’ And they’re all excited. I bring back their childhood. Ain’t that something?"
Video: Mickey Carroll talks about meeting Judy Garland at the
Chicago World’s Fair (Judy Garland was 7 at the time, Carroll was 9)
Theater Thursday: Raven Theatre’s "Hedda Gabler"
Thursday, May 14
Hedda Gabler by Henrik Ibsen
Raven Theatre, 6157 N. Clark St., Chicago
Before the performance Theater Thursday patrons will enjoy a special reception sponsored by Trattoria D.O.C. with appetizers, wine and beer and a post-show discussion with members of the cast. A contemporary woman trapped in conventional times relieves her intense boredom by constructing a dangerous game or reeking disaster on the lives of others. Hedda Gabler begs the question: How far would you go to escape? As Hedda resists the predictable world she has chosen, she unleashes a sequence of unfortunate events that brings her story to a shocking conclusion.
Event begins at 7 p.m. Show begins at 8 p.m.
TICKETS ONLY $25
For reservations call 773.338.2177 and mention “Theater Thursdays.”
Hedda Gabler
Written by Henrik Ibsen
Adapted by Jon Robin Baitz
Directed by Michael Menendian
Review: Raven Theatre’s “Hedda Gabler”
Hedda Gabler does the time warp at Raven Theatre
Review by Paige Listerud
Hedda Gabler most often gets the 19th century period treatment, so that it’s eponymous role, an epic role for women, more often than not, is interpreted in stark, severe, neurotic and even sociopathic ways. (see examples of such augmented portrayals after the fold – including Cate Blanchett and Steppenwolf’s Martha Plimpton.)
Michael Menendian, who has waited 20 years to direct this play, has pulled Henrik Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler forward to the 1930s. A time when many 19th century restrictions of gender, race, class, and propriety, still retained their grip, and yet had been slightly loosened by the gender role breakthroughs and financial excesses of the Roaring Twenties. This is not your grandmother’s Hedda; we know this Hedda, not from history, but from personal encounters with sorority sisters and Gold Coast socialites. This draws Mackenzie Kyle’s interpretation of Hedda Gabler a little further away from 19th century virago and a little closer to “Gossip Girl.”
Not that there’s anything wrong with that. If anything, this Hedda Gabler is an expertly crafted and smooth-running timepiece, with every part so honed, tempered and balanced with the others, it clips along with deceptive grace, lightness, and ease. Menendian, the sterling cast, and adaptor Jon Robin Baitz can take pride in their exertions to update a classic without overreaching. In fact, every actor’s performance is a model of technique balanced with dynamic energy and tension.
Mackenzie Kyle (Hedda Gabler) is a near-perfect blend of boredom and anxiety, exhibiting flippant social grace masking a powder keg of sadism. Ian Novak (George Tesman) humanizes his character’s history-geek ineptitude by not diminishing him to an utter buffoon. Symphony Saunders (Thea Elvsted) and Ian Paul Custer (Eilert Lovborg) deliver sincerity and intensity without over-the-top melodrama. Jon Steinhagen (Judge Brack) portrays evil with the graceful patience of a lazy, sleek cat waiting to spring. JoAnn Montemurro (Aunt Julia Tesman) is appropriately co-dependent, without being so cloying we do not see her razor’s edge, to be used against any who would threaten her beloved nephew, George. Claudia Garrison (Berta) shows in a few lines a woman who is obsequious, fearful, bitter, and knowing of her mistress.
The pacing is fast; the lines tossed off so consistently, one would think Noel Coward constructed this Ibsen play. Best Comedic Moment goes to Ian Novak, for his pregnant pause and clueless response right after Lovborg, his intellectual rival, has thrown down the gauntlet. The deft and light direction rests on the foundation provided by Baitz’s meticulous adaptation.
“To make this modern and accessible, we had to go over every line,” said Michael Menendian, “and ask why Hedda was making this choice. Was she an abused or neglected child by her military father? Is she mad? We didn’t want people to feel sorry for her and we didn’t want the audience to wait for her to just go ahead and die already. She has no real focus, no real talent, no real ambition, and no strong desires. She’s got no idea family, no idea of love. She has a crazy notion of what is Romantic. She lacks courage. She has a twisted idea of pleasure or fun.”
Hedda Gabler is indeed a scaredy-cat, but she does manage to express one clarified desire: to have total control over another human being. This well-tempered production inevitably reveals, through its internal balance, the paradoxes of sadomasochism. Hedda wishes total control but is, ultimately, totally controlled. Thea, her rival for influence in Lovborg’s life, seems almost genetically submissive. Still, she demonstrates greater courage than any other character in her willingness to sacrifice marriage, social approval, and economic security. It is, perhaps, overwrought to suggest BDSM themes regarding Hedda Gabler. Yet, while the late Victorian Age was excessively moralistic, it was never innocent. Henrik Ibsen’s crime was to say that in a crowded theater.
“I think that people are amused or fascinated by Hedda Gabler now,” said Menendian. “Not stunned, as they were in Ibsen’s time.” Indeed. I won’t claim that nothing is shocking, but with the breakdown of race, class, gender, and sexuality barriers, the shocks don’t come so hard or so startling. Not to mention, with the steady spectacle of bad behavior the celebrity rich, reality TV, and day and night soaps, we have come a little closer to Hedda, not she to us.
But, putting kink aside, even everyday power exchanges may be too much for a person who wants it all without having to give up anything. The closest Hedda comes to give and take is heightened by her final scene with Aunt Julia, who checks and counters her in as surely as any of the men in Hedda’s life. Their mutual antipathy lies beneath the veiled messages and banal social courtesies they share. Both are playing nice and nobody is fooled for a minute. The sacrifice of truth and authenticity maintains their little détente. If only Hedda could sacrifice something else, hazard something, do something that gives her life weight, value, and meaning—if not absolute freedom. If there is madness here it’s because something’s got to give in this meaningless, safe and conventional existence. This production shows the unbearable lightness of Hedda Gabler’s being.
Rating: «««½
Buy tickets here. Half-priced tickets available through StyleChicago.com.
From the web:
- Chicago Tribune: An eye-catching new face for Ibsen’s ‘Hedda’ (3 stars)
- Chicago Sun-Times: Kyle makes for memorable “Hedda Gabler” in Ibsen play at Raven Theatre (Highly Recommended)
- Chicago Critic.com: Outstanding Performance by MacKenzie Kyle anchors “Hedda Gabler”
