There are certain experiences, certain accomplishments that, understandably, pop up on most people’s Bucket Lists, those to-do lists of what we’d all like to check off before we leave this life. Travel […]
I don’t like musicals. I’m an atheist. I love Jesus Christ Superstar. I was a budding theater nerd when my cool uncle Tommy turned me on to The Who’s Tommy in 1969. […]
If Lin-Manuel Miranda reinvented the modern American musical with Hamilton in 2015, one could say John Frame, production designer on the world premiere of Faust now at Lyric Opera of Chicago, is […]
When I think of a fun night at the theater, I don’t typically think of the opera. Blame it on my generation, my relative poverty, my lack of sophistication. What can I […]
At the pre-show lecture in advance of Monday’s performance of Turandot at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, WFMT’s Carl Grapentine observed that, in the end, Puccini’s final opera—about a cold, unloving princess and […]
Opening night of the Lyric Opera of Chicago’s 2017/18 season kicked off with Christoph Willibald Gluck’s Orphée et Eurydice (Paris version), and included a first-time collaboration with the Joffrey Ballet. As my […]
The Police drummer Stewart Copeland has turned the 1940 Argentine novel into his fifth opera that’s a mix of island dwellers like Dr. Moreau and Gilligan’s Professor, while extending Bill Murray’s Groundhog […]
Lyric Opera of Chicago’s high-concept reimagination of Mozart’s classic opera, The Magic Flute couples the fantasy of its source material with the imaginative resourcefulness of several children in their backyard. From grandiose […]
Jesse Case (left) plays piano as well as Richard Wagner alongside bonafide opera singers Jonah D. Winston (center) and Tracy Cantin (right) in “Longer! Louder! Wagner,” a collaboration between the Lyric Opera and […]
Doreen Sayegh has been a skosh busy. Playwright and quote-machine William Shakespeare died 400 years ago this year, and a few folks still like to produce his work, so she is […]
“Do we really need to see Romeo and Juliet again?” asked the Lyric Opera’s pre-opening speaker. “Well, yeah,” he replied, especially during the city-wide “Shakespeare 400 Chicago” celebration, the Year of Living Iambically, […]
