The SpongeBob Musical — Oriental Theater (6/9/16)

June 13, 2016June 22, 2016 theaterinchicagoreviewsLeave a comment

For those who have not spent any time watching SpongeBob Squarepants on Nickelodeon since its premier 17 years ago, the opening number of The SpongeBob Musical (“Bikini Bottom Day” written by Jonathan Coulton) provides a brief introduction of all of the major characters. For those that have watched the show, “Bikini Bottom Day” is a spectacle of creative yet simplified costuming. Mr. Krabs (Carlos Lopez) emerges wearing giant red boxing gloves to simulate his claws, Patrick Star (Danny Skinner) has a pointy pink haircut, and Squidward (Gavin Lee) wears a pair of pants with two false legs attached. With each character introduction, the audience laughs and sometimes even applauds… this is a show that knows thy audience.

SpongeBob 1

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In the Time of the Butterflies — Teatro Vista (4/16/16 & 5/15/16)

May 17, 2016January 14, 2017 theaterinchicagoreviews1 Comment

Dedè, the most cautious of the four sister protagonists in Teatro Vista’s The Time of the Butterflies, is haunted by the accusation that she watched through her window and did nothing while her three sisters risked everything to end the dictatorship of “El Jefe” Trujillo.

Playwright Caridad Suich explores the complexity of Dedè’s character through two actors—Charìn Alvarez playing Dedè as an elderly woman and Riska Carrasco playing the younger Dedè that survived Trujillo’s 31-year reign. She was left alone to tell the story of her three sisters’ murders (which were among 30,000 deaths of those that opposed Trujillo).

Butterflies1 — Charin Alvarez and Riska Carrasco

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One-Man Star Wars Trilogy — Broadway Playhouse (4/21/16)

May 10, 2016May 17, 2016 theaterinchicagoreviews1 Comment

I’m very, very excited to tread new ground with this blog post. For the first time at theaterinchicagoreviews, we have a guest blogger: Star Wars fan and emerging theater enthusiast Matt Davis (a fellow English teacher at Bartlett High School). Please enjoy not one but two analysis of this enduring one-man show.

StarWars4

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Othello — Chicago Shakespeare (3/31/16)

April 11, 2016April 13, 2016 theaterinchicagoreviews5 Comments

Chicago Shakespeare’s Othello makes a strong case for Iago as Shakespeare’s greatest character. Not just Shakespeare’s greatest villain, mind you (give Iago 10:1 odds in that non-contest), but the overall bracket winner in the tournament of Shakespeare’s greatest creations.*

Othello7 — Michael Milligan as Iago (all photos by Liz Lauren)

While Hamlet, Brutus, and Lear expound on their inner turmoils at every turn in the road, Iago is a giant oak unmoved by morals or loyalty or the law. From the opening scene, Iago follows Othello only “to serve my turn upon him.” His guiding question, “And what’s he then that says I play a villain[?],” is not a justification to himself but a direct challenge to his audience: judge me if you want, but I was wronged long before any of this started.

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West Side Story — Paramount Theater (4/1/16)

April 5, 2016April 5, 2016 theaterinchicagoreviewsLeave a comment

Thank you to director Jim Corti and his team at the Paramount Theater for acknowledging that the West Side Story of 1957 needed some retooling.

To give due credit, Jerome Robbins was a Broadway pioneer that brought grit to the stage with his concept for West Side Story. It had ethnic slurs; it had teens talking back to adults; it questioned the validity of the American dream. But… within the grit of West Side Story, Robbins mixed in a generous supply of gold flakes. Due to choreography that Robbins created for Broadway and immortalized in the 1961 movie, gang members always looked like they would be more at home in ballet class than in an actual fight.

PT_WestSideStory_9_web — The Prolouge featuring intense fight choreography from William Carlos Angulo and R&D Choreography. Photo credit: Liz Lauren.

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Mai Dang Lao — Sideshow Theater (3/27/16)

April 3, 2016April 1, 2016 theaterinchicagoreviewsLeave a comment

Imagine buying a ticket to a musical titled Nán Wáwá. The show is set in New York during the 1930’s and begins with three gangsters singing a catchy song about gambling on horse races. Absolutely nothing about this musical is Chinese—so why isn’t the show’s title Guys and Dolls?

This scenario pertains to just one of the confusing aspects of Mai Dang Lao, a world premier produced by the Sideshow Theater Company at Victory Gardens’ upstairs theater. Mai Dang Lao is the name used for McDonald’s restaurants in China, yet any connections between this stage play and China exist solely in the playwright’s bio (David Jacobi has performed in theater companies in both America and China).

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Jerusalem — Profiles Theater (3/19/16)

April 1, 2016April 1, 2016 theaterinchicagoreviewsLeave a comment

After watching Johnny “Rooster” Byron and his drug-addicted disciples for three hours in Jerusalem, I cannot blame the residents of Wiltshire, England, for wanting him out of his trailer in the woods. Nor am I surprised that Rooster Byron was such a hit for London Theatergoers, who saw in this anti-hero the rough-around-the-edges Brittonian that is as synonymous to the British identity as Robin Hood and King Arthur.

Jerumsalem1 — Eric Salas, Scott Wolf, Jake Szczepaniak, and Darrell W. Cox

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Cocked — Victory Gardens (3/13/16)

March 29, 2016 theaterinchicagoreviewsLeave a comment

The title of Sarah Gibbins’s Cocked refers to the act of engaging a gun, and indeed a gun is central to the plot line. Oddly enough, the titular gun is central to the most notable flaw in Gibbins’s otherwise engaging script.

Cocked_1 — Kelli Simpkins, Mike Tepeli and Patrese D. McClain

The action revolves around Taylor (Kelli Simpkins, providing Chicago with another strong performance following her work in Timeline’s Spill), a high-octane corporate lawyer who begins the play with a knife in hand, ready to strike an intruder in her condo. The realization that the intruder is her brother Frank (Mike Tepeli) only slightly dissuades Taylor from using the knife.

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Proof — ColorBox Theater (3/12/16)

March 19, 2016June 29, 2016 theaterinchicagoreviewsLeave a comment

David Auburn’s Proof made me feel a little bit good about myself when I saw it twice on Broadway in 2001. Despite my being a Calculus drop-out, I’m not so different from Catherine, Robert, and Hal—math geniuses that talk about their insecurities and argue about whether to eat pasta for dinner. I can even understand the basic tenet of Catherine’s proof, which uncovers something about Germain primes (take a prime number, double it, add one, and you get another prime number… simple, right?)

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Hairspray — Paramount Theater (2/6/16)

March 13, 2016June 29, 2016 theaterinchicagoreviewsLeave a comment

Hairspray_3 — E. Faye Butler (center) and the cast of *Hairspray* performing “You Can’t Stop the Beat.” Photo credit: Liz Lauren

On Broadway, since the year 2000, only three of the 16 Tony Award winners for best musical focus on a woman as the main character—Thoroughly Modern Millie (2002); Hairspray (2003); and Fun Home (2015). Certainly a number of Broadway hit musicals include complex female characters and female-centered relationships, but for every Wicked there are two or three musicals like Spamalot or Gentleman’s Guide… shows where female characters are relegated to flat supporting roles.

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