I should disclose at the outset that American Blues Theater’s 17th annual production of It’s a Wonderful Life: Live in Chicago! is a bit of a tradition for me. A huge fan […]
Last year, I had a bit of an adventure as an extra on a movie set. And not just any movie set, either. I ended up as an extra in a bar […]
I’ve attended more opera in the last year than I have in all my years of attending theater (and that’s a lot of years!). I’ve been able to see several productions at […]
Bolstered by two knock-out performances, Green Book may just be the crowd pleaser of the holiday season. Directed by Peter Farrelly (yes, of the Farrelly Brothers and their gross-out comedies of the 1990s […]
Cinematic blindspots, those gaps in our film viewing history that mean we have to sheepishly admit to having not seen a certain classic or a hot new release, are a reality. Especially […]
Yes, we’re a week into November and you’re just now getting a Screens Monthly post with what to see in the cinema over the next few weeks. It’s already been one heck […]
Sometimes, when an actor says he or she is actually interested in directing, there’s a collective eye-roll from those within earshot. It’s like a singer saying “But what I really want to do […]
There’s this gem of a theater in Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood, and it’s keeping a little secret: the best musical theater productions in the city. Broadway touring companies aside, Porchlight Music Theatre […]
It’s not likely (though perhaps possible) that director Nick Bowling and music director Doug Peck knew when they selected Terrence McNally’s Master Class for Bowling’s 30th production at Timeline Theatre Company that Magnolia […]
What They Had is a wonderful film. There’s no use burying the lede on Chicagoan Elizabeth Chomko’s writing and directing debut. The script won the Academy’s Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting in 2015, […]
One imagines that Studio 54, the new documentary by Matt Tyrnauer about the infamous ’70s nightclub, played very well to NYC audiences when it opened there earlier this month. Chances are, the theater was […]
You’ll watch most of Beautiful Boy with a lump in your throat. The story of a father and son (Steve Carell and Timothée Chalamet) navigating the younger man’s battle with addiction, the […]
