Tuesday, April 27, 2021
After a year of heartbreak, Heather Chrisler is back to acting, as well as writing and illustrating.
In March 2020, playwright Heather Chrisler was holding audit…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 05:00PMWednesday, March 31, 2021
American Music Theatre Project unveils three student-created pieces in this year's online Capstone Festival.
Since 2005, Northwestern University's American Music…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 04:00PMTuesday, March 30, 2021
Weirdness and wonder abound in Matei Vişniec's Decomposed Theatre at Trap Door, but be prepared for creepiness, too.
With nearly 40 actors, eight directors, and…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 03:45PMTuesday, March 9, 2021
This interactive performance-piece-by-phone offers a daily dose of oddness.
The operatives at The Ministry of Mundane Mysteries (now making their Chicago debut w…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 05:00PMThursday, February 18, 2021
The annual festival of storytelling offers the freshest catches for COVID days.
In the Before Times—before the Moth, before the Stoop, before the phrase "live …
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 09:45AMTuesday, February 2, 2021
Theatre Above the Law's production lets its leads drop the masks for one moment in time.
In COVID times, gestures that would have been banal and forgettable a ye…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 04:00PMThursday, January 28, 2021
Jon Tai's intimate take on magic and storytelling comes (virtually) to A Red Orchid.
Jon Tai is something of an antimagician. Tricking you, he says, isn't exactl…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 02:00PMTuesday, January 19, 2021
This year's Bechdel Fest realigns online.
Alison Bechdel’s iconic eponymous Bechdel Test isn't the same exam it was when the award-winning graphic writer (Fun …
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 01:05PMWednesday, December 30, 2020
Fleetwood-Jourdain spearheads a new collaboration "Celebrating Life, Community and the Arts."
Shortly after the pandemic shut down the theaters, Fleetwood-Jourda…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 01:15PMTuesday, December 29, 2020
Melissa Leilani Larson and Lavina Jadhwani reimagine a classic for BIPOC voices.
More than 30 years into this gig, I've lost track of how many times I've seen Ja…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 11:15AMWednesday, December 2, 2020
With a trio of walkabout podcasts, Chicago Children’s Theatre urges kids to go take a hike.
Aztec deities. Sistine Chapel replicas.…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 10:00AMTuesday, October 20, 2020
The crafty, supernatural queen hosts the webseries Knitting’s A Drag.
The queendom of drag is vast and diverse: There are comedy queens and look queens and ins…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 03:40PMTuesday, October 13, 2020
Random Acts, Unwell, and PlayMakers Laboratory create scary stories to share (online) in the dark.
Exal Iraheta grew up listening to tales from Central American …
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 08:15PMMonday, October 5, 2020
The Neo-Futurists create short digital plays about the often-overlooked women in the White House.
Time was when the future looked rather grim indeed for the late…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 06:45PMMonday, September 21, 2020
Fire, break-ins, and COVID: the Motor Row drag palace has had a bumpy first year.
Like many drag queens, Chicago’s Tori Sass has been through it this year. It …
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 02:30PMWednesday, September 9, 2020
Their annual festival is on pandemic pause, but CLATA still celebrates the diversity of local theater companies.
When Myrna Salazar founded the Chicago Latino Th…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 01:40PMTuesday, August 25, 2020
Emmanuel Neal joins CHRP as interim managing director, but the founder's comments on Black Lives Matter spark outrage.
Add the Chicago Human Rhythm Project (CHRP…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 01:30PMTuesday, August 11, 2020
The 88-year-old musical theater icon talks about staying home—and coming out.
Back in early March, Broadway icon Joel Grey, 88, was finalizing his plans to vis…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 12:20PMMonday, July 27, 2020
Zoom past the COVID doldrums with these August workshops.
Shadow and light. Wood and paper.…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 03:45PMMonday, June 29, 2020
The Drag Race all-star challenges racism both onstage and off.
To describe the driving ethos of Chicago’s drag house Maison Couleé, you need look no further t…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 02:40PMWednesday, June 24, 2020
This year, queer performers dismantle digital boundaries while creating their own spaces.
As Pride Month unfurls amid plague and long-overdue global upheaval, yo…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 10:30AMMonday, May 25, 2020
Restructuring at the top causes an exodus—again.
Friday’s resignation of seven playwrights from Chicago’s Tony-winning, 46-year-old Victory Gardens Theater…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 03:00PMTuesday, May 5, 2020
The company's interest in the marginalized led them to Mask-er-Aid.
Since founding Uprising Theater Company in 2014, Iymen Chehade and Maren Rosenberg have worke…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 06:00PMTuesday, March 24, 2020
Her show at Steppenwolf is off for now, but the 'difficult' SNL vet still has plenty to say.
Two weeks ago, Saturday Night Live alum and west-side native Nora Du…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 06:10PMTuesday, February 25, 2020
James Ijames puts the audience on trial in this TimeLine production.
Of all the inescapable truths that James Ijames bombards his audience with in Kill Move Para…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 03:15PMTuesday, February 4, 2020
Underscore Theatre Company survives in a challenging landscape for new-works festivals.
New musicals are inherently fragile. Festivals devoted to them, exponenti…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 07:00PMThe Duke Ellington revue is pure fire and joy.
I'm no fan of imperatives, but on occasion one simply must make an exception. To wit: Stop reading this.…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 06:30PMTuesday, January 28, 2020
Lisa Loomer's docudrama examines the landmark abortion rights case.
In 1984, my roommate drove across two states so she could get a legal abortion. It took a wee…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 05:25PMJason Narducy and Brett Neveu's portrait of a 1983 teen punk band needs more edge.
The opening tune Jason Narducy penned for his autobiographically inspired musi…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 04:45PMThursday, January 23, 2020
Trent James lights up Wednesdays at the Chicago Magic Lounge.
The intersection of comedy and magic has ballooned since the art form's vaudevillian heyday. Case i…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 12:10PMWednesday, January 22, 2020
Lookingglass produces the first in J. Nicole Brooks's planned quartet of Chicago plays.
Playwright-actor-director J. Nicole Brooks wasn't yet in kindergarten whe…
SOURCE: www.chicagoreader.com at 06:00PM 
