Review: Lex the Movie Expands as Within a Shadow by Red Theater
I saw myself as a character on the stage at the Den Theatre. It was weird and exhilarating to see the everyday struggles of a young Black woman making her […]
Review: Refracted Theatre Drops a Discography on Black Agency and Dystopian Nightmares with Tambo & Bones
Review by Anthony Neri.es Tambo & Bones has come to Chicago, presented by Refracted Theatre Co. at the Den Theatre. It’s dense and thought-provoking like a treatise with a burning thesis, […]
Review: What Farce Is This? The Artistic Home Lands a Slam Dunk with Malapert Love
I do not amuse easily and when something is touted as farcical, I expect it to be on point. The Artistic Home presents a sidesplitting farce with playwright Siah Berlatsky’s […]
Review: In After the Blast, a Play About Environmental Disaster, a Robot Named Arthur Steals the Show
Zoe Kazan’s play After the Blast is set a few generations in the future—underground. An environmental disaster has made “upstairs” unlivable and some people were able to escape to a new below-ground […]
Review: Broken Nose Theatre Asks If the Cure Can Be Worse Than the Illness in This is Only a Test
I have not heard the air raid sirens in years. In the ’50s through the ’80s an air raid siren would blare every Tuesday morning at 10:30. It was heard […]
Review: Artistic Home’s Eurydice Captures Playwright Sarah Ruhl’s Quirky Charm
Orpheus and Eurydice are on the beach—two adorable young lovers. He’s lost in his music and in describing his love for Eurydice. He plays the melody he wrote for her […]
Review: The Suffrage Plays Celebrate Centennial of Women’s Voting Rights
Tennessee became the 38th state to ratify the 19th amendment on August 18, 1920, the last of the required 36 states. A women’s right to vote was officially adopted on […]
Review: Artemisia’s Sweet Texas Reckoning Resolves a Culture Clash a Bit Too Slickly
Sweet Texas Reckoning is a family story set up as a kitchen culture clash. It’s the story of a biracial, same-sex couple from New York vs. religious, bigoted Texans. The script […]
Horror is Healing: A Conversation with Hilary Williams of WildClaw Theatre’s Second Skin
Hilary Williams loves horror. In the dim light of the bar at the Den Theatre (where she is performing in Wildclaw Theatre’s production of Second Skin) her eyes grow wide when […]
In Refrigerator at First Floor Theater, We’re Depositing Our Consciousness … Somewhere
Refrigerator is a play about the future. A dystopian future, of course. Playwright Lucas Baisch speculates that some day we will be willing to get rid of our physical bodies and […]
Theater Oobleck’s Reality Is an Activity: 90 Delectable Minutes of Poetry and Word Play
Reality Is an Activity is not a typical theatrical production. It’s short on plot and character development. But it’s a symphony of humorous word play and a love song to poetry, […]
Haven Theatre’s Fear and Misery in the Third Reich: Brecht’s Ghost Warns Us About Fascist Dictatorship
Fear and Misery in the Third Reich can be described as Bertolt Brecht’s ghost arriving to warn us about the United States of Donald Trump turning into a fascist dictatorship. […]