Chicago Stage Review

By J. Scott Hill

Chicago theatre is so vital and dynamic that there was a lot to love in 2009.  My fantastic year in the audience began with Lori McClain’s beautiful barrage of obscenity as Patty Blagojevich in Rod Blagojevich Superstar! at Second City e.t.c., and ended with Jill Erickson’s movingly recalcitrant and affirming “Prostitute” monologue in the Beast Women 2009 Winter Series at PROP THTR.  Between those two outstanding performances, I experienced too many examples of exceptional artistry in theatre around Chicagoland for me to compile a comprehensive “Best of” list, but here are a few highlights….

History Boys was a runaway hit for TimeLine, well worthy of such success; Brian Sidney Bembridge designed a runaway set that was pure genius — part classroom and part field house, with dorm rooms spilling out of the theatre to overtake the lobby. Alex Weisman shone brightest from the talented ensemble, giving us layer upon layer of the struggles of youth, and demonstrating how so many of those struggles wind up never being resolved.

At the opposite end of maturity, James Harms blew the audience away as Cervantes/Don Quixana/Don Quixote in Man of La Mancha at Theatre at the Center.  While “The Impossible Dream” is the franchise number, Harms exceeded all possible expectations with that song and indeed throughout the entire show.

Frank Galati’s Prospero in The Tempest at Steppenwolf breathed life anew into the contemplative, forgiving side of Shakespeare’s master sorcerer. Step’s Tempest was a triumph for director Tina Landau, in no small part due to the incredible acrobatics and longing for a mortal life of Jon Michael Hill’s Ariel.

Other spirits possessed the Mercury Theatre.  When FPA Theatre Company remounted The Screwtape Letters with a new cast, Peter Kevoian sparkled like fool’s gold as the senior devil Screwtape. Aislinn J. Mulligan richly haunted the stage as his wordless minion, Toadpipe — a fallen Jellicle Cat in apoplectic fits of contortion, yet exuding languorous grace.  Scenic Designer Cameron Anderson’s black-on-black raked dungeon was gluttony for the eyes.

Some devilry must have extracted the soul from Kevin V. Smith’s Orlando in The Conduct of Life — presented by Tooth and Nail and by Two Lights at the Viaduct.  Smith’s brutal, megalomaniacal military interrogator was riveting and vile.  Director Marti Lyons added elements of chamber theatre, modern dance, and Japanese Butoh movement to heighten the tension while stylizing the extreme physical and emotional violence.

Brian Amidei scared the crap out of me as the tethered zombie Joe in WildClaw’s The Revenants at Angel Island.  What could have come across as silly had menace. Charlie Athanas’s basement set created a marvelously uneasy environment for The Revenants – in particular, the partial wall collapse in the opening scene.

Evil was not the only thing that drew my notice on the Chicago stage in 2009. Jenn Remke embodied compassion itself as Rose of Sharon in The Grapes of Wrath, produced by Infamous Commonwealth at the Raven. Jennifer Mathews as Ma Joad was the heart and soul of the excellent ensemble for most of the production, but for the show’s final, heart-wrenching scene, Remke was imbued with new purpose: creating a beatific vision that left the audience in tears.

There were moments of pure joy onstage, too. Larry Wyatt was delightfully goofy as Leo Clark/Maxine — a down-on-his-luck actor pretending to be a demurely bombastic actress in order to inherit a fortune — in the implausible Leading Ladies at Theatre at the Center. Steve Tolin’s special effects for the black comedy The Lieutenant of Inishmore at Northlight brought smiles to splatterpunk fans.  Macabaret at Porchlight was a frightfully good evening of spooky banter and tongue-in-cheek torch songs.

Vaudezilla gave Chicago a thrill with Rollin’ Outta Here Naked: A Big Lebowski Burlesque at Gorilla Tango and later at the Chopin, interspersing recreated scenes from the cult movie with inventive striptease acts. Red Hot Annie elegantly performed “Maude’s Sheet Dance” that utilized a couple of yards of gossamer instead of a fan-dancer’s ostrich plumes.  Wham Bam Pam uproariously played Walter (John Goodman’s character), and did an oddly titillating bump-and-grind in which she first stripped out of her Walter fat suit before stripping off her lingerie.

The most fun at the theatre in 2009 was Animal Crackers at the Goodman. Adapter/Director Henry Wishcamper made the Marx Brothers contemporary and vibrant in this rollicking revival. Stanley Wayne Mathis’s song-and-dance, “Keep Your Undershirt On,” was the purest single piece of entertainment I saw on stage all year.  Ora Jones and Molly Brennan gave us vibrant and original yet respectful takes on the characters that came to define Margaret Dumont and Harpo Marx.  Jonathan Brody was more Chico than Chico.

…and then, there was Joey Slotnick.  Slotnick gave the best musical-comedy performance in town in 2009 as Captain Spaulding/Groucho in Animal Crackers.  To play the madcap Groucho in his signature role without resorting to caricature, to sing and dance and crack wise and ad-lib as a character within a character — Slotnick obviously approached his role in this delightful romp as seriously as one might approach the role of Macbeth.

Kevin Cox triumphed as the Creature in Playing with Fire (after Frankenstein), produced by BoHo at Heartland Studio.

Cox’s powerful physicality and vocalization commanded rapt attention.  His emotional portrayal garnered great sympathy from the audience. Cox gave this manmade abomination a soul.

One of the most mesmerizing performances of the year came from Beau O’Reilly as Davies in The Caretaker, presented by Curious Theatre Branch at the Side Project. Colm O’Reilly and Jeff Bivens were uncompromisingly disturbed as Ashton and Mick, but Beau O’Reilly’s disjointed transient Davies had an undercurrent of unrealized threat that made you keep him in your eye, even if he was only fumbling around in the background.  This was a great production, a study in how to convey absurdity to an audience in a way the audience can wrap its brain around.

Not to be outdone by his father, Colm O’Reilly captivated the audience — literally and figuratively — in Theatre Oobleck’s aptly claustrophobic revival of Mickle Maher’s An Apology For the Course and Outcome of Certain Events Delivered by Doctor John Faustus on This His Final Evening at the Chopin. O’Reilly’s John Faustus still suffers over the existential dilemma, and that dilemma is in crisis as his mortal existence is about to be replaced with an eternity in Hell.  Colm O’Reilly as Faustus is all over the place: regretful and unapologetic, contemplative and blurting, powerful and frail.  His performance is the noise of a human mind, full of second thoughts and second-guesses — relentless self-examination without relief or resolution.  Watching him deconstruct his privileged, unhappy life was like trying to talk someone off of a ledge without being able to get a word in edgewise or formulate a worthy rejoinder. Complicated and intimate and disturbing, Colm O’Reilly filled every pause with seething, roiling mental anguish over not being able to parse it all out and make his life matter in any substantive way.  This is one of the best performances I have ever seen, or will ever see.

The most moving performance of the year came from Mary Beth Fisher as Eleanor and the adult Esme in Rock ‘N’ Roll at the Goodman. I marveled goggle-eyed at Fisher conducting an acting master class on showing an audience the full range of the human condition, through the adversity of terminal illness as Eleanor and over the experiences of a lifetime as Esme — subtlety and depth that were unmatched onstage in Chicago last year.

I want to take a few lines to make a special notice of one performer who had an exceptional year in 2009: Larry Adams.  A fixture in Theatre at the Center shows, Larry Adams was in four shows I attended, and wowed me every time. As Rev. Wooley in Leading Ladies, Adams played a petty, superior man with wonderful hatefulness.  As theatre impresario Bela Zangler in Crazy for You, Adams went engagingly over-the-top.  As Reverend Moore in Footloose, Larry Adams wrestled with the impact of life’s tragedies, and deeply moved the audience with the song “Heaven Help Me.“ As the Duke/Dr. Sanson Carrasco/The Knight of the Mirrors in Man of La Mancha, he conveyed a level of introspection untypical for that pompous role.  Cheers for Larry Adams, a versatile workhorse character actor.

Thank you to all of the performers, directors, and designers mentioned above — and the hundreds of others there was no space to mention — for your amazing work in Chicago theatre in 2009.  I cannot wait to see what 2010 brings.

By J. Scott Hill

Death comes to everyone in time, and if one is very lucky they leave behind people who grieve them.  Everyone grieves differently, yet everyone grieves the same.  There are festive wakes and dour funerals and uplifting memorial services and comfortable-looking caskets and manicured cemeteries and decorative urns and an endless string of euphemisms to help people more easily cope with death.  We tend toward ceremony, ritual, and metaphor to ease our emotional suffering. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross identified the Five Stages of Grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.  The grief-stricken experience these stages in no particular order; one does not necessarily experience all of the stages, but everyone experiences at least two. Joan Didion gives the world an intimate view of her lived-experience of the bargaining stage in The Year of Magical Thinking, the one-woman show she adapted (with significant elaboration) from her National Book Award-winning memoir. Court Theatre presents the Chicago premiere of The Year of Magical Thinking, under the direction of Charles Newell.  Chicago treasure Mary Beth Fisher takes on the formidable task of playing Joan.

Didion’s book The Year of Magical Thinking deals with her adjustment to being a widow. John Gregory Dunne, her husband of nearly forty years and sometimes collaborator, died suddenly in December of 2003, while their daughter, Quintana, was in the hospital in a coma.  In August of 2005, while Didion was gearing up for the book tour for Magical Thinking, she suffered another devastating loss, which I will not describe here.  Courageously, Didion expanded upon her memoir for the stage adaptation, including this compounded tragedy.  Her style is New Journalism yet scientific — always holding her personal experience at arm’s length as she describes it, marked by a combination of anxiety and emotional coolness, as if she were composing her prose while levitating over the scene during an out-of-body experience.  While this has been Didion’s style in her non-fiction for most of her career, it is particularly suited to the performance of the subject matter. No one could tell these stories of introspection and grief otherwise without melting into a murky puddle of pathos.

Upon entering the theatre, I was immediately aware that the exposed set, even under the house lights, is a simple gem.  Against a black background, a single small room is raised into the air on a black platform.  The herringbone hardwood floor is roughly the size of a prison cell with only a sturdy chair and table upon it.  The floor has a wide and definite border and overhangs its platform, so that under stage lighting, it appears to be hovering over nothingness.  Scenic Designer John Culbert has cleverly assured, even before the character Joan takes the stage, that we can sense her isolation.

The theatre goes black.  The stage lights come up and Mary Beth Fisher as Joan has materialized alone in that small room that floats in a black and empty universe.  Joan begins, “When this happens to you….”  When, never if.  Joan is giving her audience some much-needed guidance in preparation for inevitable grief, a primer in how to well negotiate the logical and emotional traps set by such an acute and devastating change.

This is a fine example of why Mary Beth Fisher is a treasure.  Fisher as Joan is not exactly cool, calm, and collected: she is warm, anxious, and collected.  Another actor, another excellent actor, would be likely to take the character Joan through a number of emotional breakdowns and breakthroughs.

Part of me wanted to see Fisher in a reprise of her role as Eleanor in Tom Stoppard’s Rock ‘N’ Roll at the Goodman last year (also directed by Charles Newell).  Eleanor traversed a wide range of emotions as she struggled with her own protracted illness, her impending death, and her husband’s utter failure to make her his priority. Joan’s emotional makeup is nothing like Eleanor’s.  Joan is neither stolid nor mechanical, but she is obsessed with making things right, with being right. “Fix it,” is her battle cry.  Joan is not relaying what she is feeling; she is relating what she felt. She is without her sounding board and foil, her muse, the love of her life.  She is waiting, antithetically to what she knows to be correct, for her dead husband’s impossible return.

Joan’s intellect has been perverted, by her grief, into magical thinking: thinking that she must do the right things, prepare in the right ways so that her John can return, knowing full well that he cannot.  Mary Beth Fisher as Joan holds her recent past in her hand like a piece of amber, turning it over and over, examining it from multiple angles and distances, painstakingly describing every tragic inclusion.  The power of this performance is its containment.   She must always be right and yet in this most devastating of instances can not possibly be right.  Her tinge of anxiety masks the roiling wet flashbacks in her mind.  Her lifetime in journalism gives her the appearance of interrogative impartiality even in self-examination, while she knows full well that this simply cannot be the case.

Mary Beth Fisher plays Joan with a subtlety of awareness and delusion that makes audience members inhale hard, as if stubbing their toes on the contradictions.  They shake their heads with a note of sympathy and a prayer that they may never be able to empathize with Joan — that Joan would have not been right at the onset in her warning, “When this happens to you….” We never truly pity Joan, and she never seeks the comfort of pity.

It is impossible to discern what of this subtlety comes from Fisher’s intimacy with the text and the character, and what comes from the guiding hand of Charles Newell.  Their collaboration in presenting this understated deconstruction of self has a lingering effect, revealing the nature and depth of this grief more and more in the hours and days after one sees this performance.

There are five stages of grief and we see Joan Didion’s experience of one stage, bargaining: I must do this or that so my husband can return.  We know he can’t.  She knows he can’t.  Knowing what is true and right doesn’t lessen the bargaining whatsoever.  Being right does not modify the desire, the need, to have him back.  Joan Didion may have worked through her grief in her prose, but her impossible bargains have not relented to another stage of grief, and she has not worked past it.

DO NOT MISS Mary Beth Fisher living out Joan Didion’s rational insanity in the wake of death.

4 STARS

(“The Year of Magical Thinking” runs through Feb 14, at Court Theatre, 5535 S. Ellis Avenue.  773-753-4472)

The Year of Magical Thinking \ Court Theatre - Professional Theatre at the University of Chicago

The Year of Magical Thinking production photos by Michael Brosilow.

By J. Scott Hill

The all-female cabaret Beast Women is currently running its 2009 Winter Series. Saturdays at 10:30, while Saturday Night Live is tediously tearing down the president it helped elect, the Beast Women are giving the audiences at Prop Thtr something far more fun to talk about around the water cooler on Monday morning: live theatre, pure entertainment, all women. Recently, the keepers of this menagerie of Beasties — Jill Erickson (left, in the above photo) and Michelle Power — spent some time talking with Chicago Stage Review about their particular brand of cabaret.

Chicago Stage Review: Let’s begin at the very beginning. How did the Beast Women show come to be?

Michelle Power: Beast Women started several years ago when Michael Martin would feature the solo work of a selected number of women he asked to perform under his company at the time, Great Beast Theatre. Thus the name “Beast Women” first appeared.

Jill Erickson: Michelle and I were part of Great Beast Theatre company. I worked on Beast Women for the last three years of the companies existence. It was low-key, and only went up once a year for a few weeks. It was mainly poetry and performance art. It provided me my very first solo performance where I used my own material. I helped run Beast Women with Michael Martin. It got overwhelming for me sometimes being a newbie to store front theatre: getting spaces (usually coffee houses), renting lights that we would have to put up and take down, loading them in my Geo Metro. Then, the next night, load up and do it again. Sometimes, ladies just wouldn’t show up, so it became very spontaneous. I would ask a woman out of the audience if she would like to replace the no-show, only knowing that she performed poetry because she told me before the show started. I had no idea what was going to happen, but it certainly would be entertaining.

MP: Spring of 2007, Jill Erickson agreed with Michael that Beast Women should be resurrected. This time, Jill wanted to do it differently and produce it with former Great Beast Theatre member, Michelle Power (hey, that’s me!). The show would be done with new energy, professionalism, and a unique sense of artistry. One of the first things we insisted on was that all women must audition for a chance to perform in the show. We also broadened the scope to include more than just poetry and monologue. Now, Beast Women typically showcases a wide variety of acts, including music, erotic poetry, standup comedy, belly dancing, clown performance, spoken word, magic, Burlesque, fire spinning, etc. Our goal is to showcase the best female talent in Chicago and provide an environment where women are comfortable to be free to show their strength, individuality, and sexuality, while also entertaining our audience.

CSR: The 2009 Winter Series runs for seven weeks. Is this typical?  Do you have a core group of Beast Women who perform at all or most of the shows?

MP: We typically do three series a year, each running from 6-8 weeks. For each series, we cast a group of 20-30 women to perform in a rotating lineup.

JE: Given the amount of Beasties we cast we try and get them in to perform at least twice during the run. Our veteran Beasties are a really nice foundation for the show, some are: Chyna Fox (piano songstress), Janet Kane (comedian) Jackie Wolk (monologist), Mahira (belly dancer), Roberta Miles (monologist), Amanda Rountree (monologist/Shakespearean improv), Kelsie Huff (comedian/ monologist), Jen Stjarna (piano songstress), [and] Red Hot Annie (Burlesque).

MP: Of course Jill also performs in every series. She is a performance artist and “Original Beast Woman.” The Beasties we have cast for multiple series include Amy Sumpter (comedy), Marianne Schaefer (erotic poetry), Noel Williams (Pochinko clown), [and] Sarah Heston (ballet/modern dancer). Like all of our girls, we require that the veteran performers audition again. We ask that they continue to raise the bar of their performance levels. The women above have always lived up to that, so they’ve been featured in quite a few shows.

CSR: What other different kinds of variety acts would you like to see in future Beast Women series?

JE: It would be cool to get some aerialist.

MP: Unfortunately, we are not able to accommodate those kinds of acts in the space we are currently performing in, but as we continue to grow, I see ourselves in other venues where we’d be able to put on those kinds of acts. I would also like to see more fire acts, Vaudeville, maybe even puppeteers.

JE: I would love to see some martial artists, gymnasts, drummers, violinists and/or cellists.

MP; I’d like to see more collaborative work between artists that would incorporate music and dance together. I’ve also considered having a painter or sculptor create a piece of work (start to finish) during the time frame of a show. Anything’s possible!

CSR: As both the curators of a cabaret variety show and as performers, who influenced you to do what you do?

JE: As a performer, without a doubt it would be Laurie Anderson. I remember reading her work and thinking how amazing it was, and then when I actually saw her perform, my jaw just dropped. I remember thinking… That’s it, I want to do solo work. That influence was furthered after reading artists like Karen Finley and Nicole Blackman — and seeing Spalding Gray and Henry Rollins. My mind was made up for me. I never started out wanting to put together a cabaret type of show. I did like being part of them, though. It was a great place to explore my work. Now, I feel very devoted to helping create this opportunity where other women get to put their art to life. The only way any of this works, though, is with the addition of Michelle. Without her passion, creativity, drive, and sanity, this would have been over a long time ago.

MP: With regard to Beast Women, Jill has been the biggest influence for me. Jill has always wanted to perform her own work, and Beast Women is the perfect outlet for all women to do the same. Once we began producing the show, driven by Jill’s passion to see new life breathed into Beast Women, it was clear to me that the kind of impact we were having on female artists was a strong, palpable one. I can’t thank Jill enough for asking me to join forces with her on this. The creative, supportive, stimulating environment that is felt is simply unmatched.

CSR: Overall, the vibe of Beast Women is fairly neutral regarding men. Is this a balance that happens organically, or do you have a philosophy that you adhere to regarding this?

JE: We have stood by the original rule of no “male bashing.” There are plenty of other platforms that women can vent; we want to showcase these women’s strength, their love, and talent. If you focus on these things, male bashing doesn’t even become an issue.

MP: The name Beast Women definitely gets your attention, but that’s all we want. Once the audience is in the door, they realize it’s no “bitch-fest.” We make a point to always declare what Beast Women is and represents, versus saying what we are not. But if someone asks if our performers present angry work about men, the answer is a definite and resounding “NO.” Beast Women is a celebration of women in the arts, and we hope all are open to that.

CSR: Who makes up the audience for a typical Beast Women show?

MP: We have seen every type in our audience: men, women, young, old, gay, straight, married, single, etc. The audiences have been so diverse. Our performers represent all types of women, and we welcome all who want to see them.

JE: There isn’t a particular group I would like to see more of, just more people. I love hearing that random people read about us or saw a poster and decided to come.

CSR: Speaking of your poster, the poster for the 2009 Winter Series is pretty awesome. Who did the photography and the design?

JE: we have the best PR person, Kelsie Huff; she comes up with the images and designs. The photos we use of our Beast Women are taken by Hunter Matthews.

CSR: Beast Women’s Technical Director Ed Schweitzer appears to be the only Beastie boy. How did he become involved with Beast Women and what does he bring to the process and productions?

JE: Ed and I have been working together for about eight years, and he has always been my tech genius. I brought him with me into Beast Women. I would never use anyone else. I don’t know how he does it but he just makes things work, and lights up the ladies wonderfully — always professional, always kickass.

MP: My two cents: Ed is AWESOME!  I’ve never met a more positive, problem-solving person in my whole life. He makes what we envision a reality.

CSR: Where do you want to take Beast Women for the next series and beyond?

MP: Right now, our goal is to continue to showcase the best of Chicago’s veteran female performers, as well as up and coming talent. We hope to always raise the bar when it comes to the cast and the material presented onstage. We had considered an open run at first, but we wanted to make sure there was enough buzz. We want to keep the masses in a state of anticipation. One day, I see Jill and I setting up Beast Women in other U.S. cities. We’re just getting started in a lot of ways, and I can’t wait to see what happens next.

JE: Currently, the three series works for us. I would like Santa to bring us our own theatre, but I’m pretty sure that request is on backorder. There’s some talk about travel, sharing the Beastie goodness with others outside of Chicago, but right now were focused on finishing Winter Series, because as soon as it’s over, it’s time to start developing Spring Series — never a dull moment.

CSR: How many shows are left in the Winter Series?  Are you currently involved with any other live performance in town besides Beast Women?

MP: One show remains for Winter Series – Saturday 12/19 at 10:30pm.

JE: I also perform in a little spoken word show called Loose Chicks — an hour-long evening of short stories with my fellow Beastie and femme fatale Roberta Miles — December 16th at 7:30 p.m. at Latte, 4227 N. Lincoln. BYOB. Great food, fantastic entertainment.

CSR: With Winter Series winding down, are you already thinking ahead to Spring Series?  When can we expect our first glimpse of Beast Women 2010? How should aspiring Beasties get in touch with Beast Women Productions?

JE: Where we will be is not yet set. We’re on the prowl. We love The Prop Thtr; we have been very happy there for a long time.

MP: Prop Thtr has been a great host and allowed us to really polish and fine-tune our show. However, we do not have residency there. We are considering other venue options for the future and hopefully one day, we’ll have our own place to call home.

JE: I think people can start looking for Spring Series around February or March. If people are interested in auditioning, they can always email me jerickson@beastwomenproductions.com.

MP: I think an April opening is more realistic. Auditions will probably be in February. We are already working on Spring Series. We will keep updated information about auditions and the show via our website, www.beastwomenproductions.com, and our information line, 773-278-1212.

Images by Hunter Matthews

Check out this Chicago Stage Review of one of the Beast Women Winter Series 2009 shows:

Beast Women 2009 Winter Series – REVUE REVIEW - Chicago Stage Review

Recap of Nina Flowers at SPIN Nightclub

By J. Scott Hill

Her name is Loca.  She is a showgirl — a showgirl who knows the age-old advice, “Always leave them wanting more.”

The original Miss Loca herself, Nina Flowers — runner-up and Miss Congeniality from the first season of RuPaul’s Drag Race — teased an enthusiastic audience with her elaborate costumes and impossibly vertical hair Saturday night at SPIN Nightclub on Belmont at Halsted.  Nina Flowers, AKA Jorge Flores, came to Chicago for one night only on December 5.

On RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nina Flowers was a fan favorite.  For the uninitiated, the LOGO/VH-1 series RuPaul’s Drag Race is a drag-queen competition reality show that is one part America’s Next Top Model, one part Project Runway, and a whole lot of fierceness.  Miss Nina excelled in every way: performance, makeup, hair, costume making and modification, sass, but most important, kindness.  She showed immense class, humility, and poise in a television genre designed to glorify and reward backstabbing, bitchiness, and secret alliances.

At SPIN Nightclub, Nina’s two numbers were energetic and crowd-pleasing — the second number being her new hit dance single with Ranny, “Loca” (#41 this week on the Billboard Dance/Club Play charts).  She was energetic, athletic, and beautiful.

Miss Loca is like a cross between Ivana Trump and Carmen Miranda, as re-envisioned by Patrick Nagel.  Such exotic fabulousness takes a lot of primping.  Nina Flowers does not just throw her face on and slip into her shift five minutes before curtain. Nooo.

Nina Flowers needs a little prep time.

Her two numbers were scheduled an hour apart, with a fan meet-and-greet to follow.  Nina Flowers comes to us from Puerto Rico originally, by way of Denver.  For a one-night-only performance for a mere $10 cover, it is understandable that she did not bring a giant entourage and one of her famous DRAMA DRAG shows like the ones she conducts monthly at her home club (Tracks in Denver).  Two numbers, a costume change — and maybe a hug, an air kiss, and a photo op — were priceless to the club full of her adoring fans. Most scintillated with anticipation for the hour between Miss Nina’s two numbers.

Still, I wish that SPIN Nightclub would have filled that time better.  Encouraging patrons to belly up to the bar while they feel the thump of the subwoofer does not sustain the level of energy with which Nina Flowers had infused the room.  Miss Loca’s appearance drew some pretty amazing local drag queens — some obviously paying homage to Nina’s signature look (Yes, you in the black with the feathers, I am thinking especially of you; I wish I would have taken your picture to include here).  SPIN Nightclub could have showcased some of Chicago’s sizeable pool of drag talent between Miss Nina’s numbers.  There could have been a Nina Flowers drag-alike contest.  They could have even hired a couple of birthday party clowns to make dirty balloon animals with condoms.  Most of the crowd was just happy that Nina came to visit, but I wanted more show in the show.

I realize that sometimes talent has a rider in their contract about being the only performer that evening: no one wants to come to town only to be upstaged by the locals.  But could Miss Congeniality Nina Flowers ever have a rider so catty and unsporting? Never, locas.

If you weren’t at the Nina Flowers appearance at SPIN Nightclub Saturday night, you missed a great little piece of drag spectacle — the only negative being that it was barely a taste.  I think Nina Flowers could have put on a three-hour extravaganza and still left her audience wanting more.  I hope the divine Miss Loca returns to Chicago soon, with either a full DRAMA DRAG show, or onstage support from some fine Chicago drag queens who can make the time during her costume changes feel as if it is flying by on gossamer wings.

Nina Flowers’s Homepage:

http://ninaflowers.com/

SPIN Nightclub:

http://www.spin-nightclub.com/

RuPaul’s Drag Race:

http://www.logoonline.com/shows/dyn/rupauls_drag_race/series.jhtml

Track Nightclub/DRAMA DRAG:

http://www.tracksdenver.com/content/

The single “Loca” by Ranny, featuring Nina Flowers, is available on iTunes and at Masterbeat:

http://www.masterbeat.com/

Nina Flowers performance photo by J. Scott Hill.

Nina Flowers poster photo by Venus Zarris.

By J. Scott Hill

This time of year, I hear people say, “Don’t forget the reason for the season.”  Depending on what you believe, the reason for the season may be the birth of Jesus, the solstice and the lengthening days that follow, the miracle of the oil, or something else entirely.  Although the details of our reasons for the season may differ, the spirit of the season is generally thought to be universal — peace, giving, good fellowship.  According to The Christmas Schooner, currently running at Theatre at the Center, the reasons for the season are ardent German jingoism, the creation of a secondary revenue stream, and profit over safety.

From 1996 through 2008, the Bailiwick Repertory Theatre ran The Christmas Schooner as its holiday show.  The Bailiwick closed earlier this year but will return in a different location as a new and reorganized company, Bailiwick Chicago, in the spring of 2010.  This show was a huge success at the Bailiwick and is beloved by many — theatregoers and critics alike; I am not among them.

The basic story of The Christmas Schooner — a 19^th century Michigan schooner captain determined to sail the icy waters of Lake Michigan well-past safe sailing season to deliver a load of Christmas trees to Chicago — could have been rendered in a heartwarming, deeply moving manner.  The actors did everything possible to try to accomplish this. The songs by Julie Shannon went a long way toward this end.

But, the play’s the thing.

Playwright John Reeger is a talented and accomplished Chicago actor who has often been seen onstage at Court Theatre, as well as Drury Lane Oakbrook, and even at Theatre at the Center.  Unfortunately, this script does not rise to the proven and immense talent of its author. Reeger’s script is sometimes warm and funny, though never organically so, nor is it character-driven in its humor.  Always the laughs come through some sort of schtick (given all the German cultural pride in this script, I should not sully the Yiddish word schtick here, but stick with the German Stück).  Mostly, the book for this show glorifies the capitalistic impulse that has squelched the very spirit of the holiday season, so much so that the ten-minute epilogue smacks of a short industrial propaganda film one might see during a factory tour.

The show opens with the Stossel family patriarch, Gustav, insulting his daughter-in-law for not being a true, pure German, but rather a German Swiss, a Schweizerdeutsche — Switzerland being an ethnically and linguistically mixed country.  The actors do their utmost to keep this scene light and loving.  While the scene continues on about the Stossels being immigrants and having a new ethnic identity as Americans, it is still a shaky foundation upon which to build a family-oriented holiday show.  It would be a simplistic fantasy to believe that such attitudes did not and do not exist, but they really have no place in a show that Theatre at the Center bills as “already becoming a perennial holiday classic.”

The story continues with an income-bright, safety-dim entrepreneurial idea. Safe sailing season on the Great Lakes has ended for the winter.  Captain Peter Stossel needs to clear the small trees choking his timberland near the paper-mill town of Manistique on the southern shore of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.  A letter from his cousin in Chicago gives him a moneymaking epiphany: take a boatload of this Michigan scrub pine down to Chicago under nigh-impossible sailing conditions and sell it as Christmas trees to German-descended Chicagoans.  Many such voyages were made.  Lives were lost, but the valuable freight still got to Chicago every Christmas, and the money was still made.

Brandon Dahlquist plays the clever, German-descended captain, Peter Stossel.  Earlier this year, he played Ernst Ludwig in Cabaret at Drury Lane Oakbrook — complex and subtle in his underlying Nazi evil; here, his performance is unceasingly positive and open and good-natured.  Dahlquist gives more complexity to his portrayal than the archetypal character demands.

The captain’s wife, Alma Stossel, is played by Cory Goodrich.  Goodrich is the best singer in this production and really showcases her chops during “Loving Sons.”  As an actor, Goodrich takes a stock character and brings her to life in three dimensions.  Goodrich recently played another fretting mother at Theatre at the Center — Vi Moore (the preacher’s wife) in Footloose; her interpretations of the two similar roles are wildly different from one another.

The phenomenal Peter Kevoian plays Gustav as a loving Vater merely giving his daughter-in-law a gentle ribbing in the beginning, showing his strength and kindheartedness throughout.  Kevoian is a dynamite actor and a talented singer and plies his craft deftly as this cantankerous curmudgeon.  He is the tough leather binding holding this family’s story together.

The ensemble is mostly terrific — with extra kudos to Ronald Keaton as Oskar (the comic-relief sailor) and Mitchell Rose as the teenaged Karl (Peter and Alma’s son). The three principals — Dahlquist, Goodrich, and Kevoian — are like….  I was going to put a fairly unkind simile here that stressed that these are excellent performers who outshine the material they are performing, but that would not be in keeping with the spirit of the season.

If you loved The Christmas Schooner at Bailiwick, if it was an annual part of your holiday season, then by all means go see these wonderful actors in what may be the finest possible production of this show.  If you are a theatre tech junkie, it is worth the price of admission just to marvel at Scenic Designer Jack Magaw’s hydraulic schooner prow!  If you are looking for a show to fill you with the spirit of the holiday season, however, The Christmas Schooner may not float your boat.

2 STARS

( “The Christmas Schooner“ runs through Dec 20, 2009, at Theatre at the Center, 1040 Ridge Rd., Munster, Indiana.  219-836-3255)

Theatre at the Center (Munster,IN)

By J. Scott Hill

Burlesque has made a strong comeback into the popular imagination in recent years.  1950s pinup/stag-film star/bondage queen/legendary sex symbol Bettie Page was the subject of two recent biopics.  The Burlesque dance troupe The Pussycat Dolls has become a chart-topping pop group.  Retro-Burlesque performer Dita Von Teese has her own signature-edition Wonderbra.

There is Burlesque going on all over Chicago — as individual acts appearing in cabaret revues, as bartop shows, as late-night theatre shows, and even as full-blown, prime-time theatrical events.  In just a year and a half, pinup model Red Hot Annie and her co-conspirator Dick Dijon have taken their Vaudezilla Productions to the forefront of the Chicago Burlesque scene.

Recently, Red Hot Annie, Dick Dijon, and the performers and “Vixens” of Vaudezilla gave Chicago Rollin’ Outta Here Naked: A Big Lebowski Burlesque, interspersing live actors recreating favorite scenes from the cult classic, with gorgeous Burlesque dancers provocatively removing nearly all of their clothing. One Vaudezilla dancer (Wham Bam Pam) played John Goodman’s character Walter, first having to tease her way out of the fat suit before teasing her way out of the lingerie underneath. Another of Vaudezilla’s talented Burlesque dancers (Maria May I) played John Turturro’s character Jesus Quintana, replete with the purple jumpsuit and obscene bowling-ball buffing routine.  The show was highly entertaining and was so successful in its run at the Gorilla Tango Theatre that it enjoyed a one-night remount of two performances at the Chopin Theatre.

For Halloween, Vaudezilla took over the historic Portage Theatre for Vaudezilla’s Monster Burlesque Academy. About twenty Burlesque and variety acts from all over the city lined up to perform in this event.  Most of the crowd came in their own sexy costumes. Vaudezilla performer Bonny Babs did what might be called an inverted-mermaid striptease that was thrillingly weird. Red Hot Annie herself ended the show with her own Bride of Frankenstein routine that heated up the evening of chills.

Vaudezilla is mounting revues in theatres and bars around the city at an ever-increasing rate.  When they are not appearing all together in the altogether, Vaudezilla’s performers are appearing individually in lots of other Burlesque and cabaret shows around town.  Even with so many commitments, Red Hot Annie was kind enough to talk with me about Vaudezilla and her own Burlesque routines.

CHICAGO STAGE REVIEW: Red Hot Annie, thank you for taking time out of your hectic schedule to talk with Chicago Stage Review.  First off, how do you yourself refer to what you do onstage: Burlesque dancer, striptease artist, performance artist?

RED HOT ANNIE: Burlesque dancer is best, although I don’t mind any of the other titles.

CSR: What is the difference between a burlesque dancer in a Vaudezilla revue and a stripper at one of the “gentlemen’s clubs” advertised so prominently along the expressway?

RHA: Hah.  You’d be surprised how often we get this question!  The answer is that with Burlesque, you don’t work for tips, you don’t do private dances, and there’s an emphasis on the tease.  In Chicago, we often wait until the very last minute to show our pasties, even.

CSR: Vaudezilla dancers certainly excel at the tease.  At the Halloween show especially, the audience sounded like they were watching a fireworks display — ooohing and ahhhing.  That was in a 1300-seat theater.  How do the performances differ in a bar setting?

RHA: The bar shows are a little more casual in nature — the hosting is more straightforward, and there’s rarely an over-arching story like there was with Monster Burlesque Academy or Big Lebowski Burlesque….  The acts are a bit more random, too.  We like to cultivate the feeling of a party when we are doing bar shows.

CSR: Your schedule seems pretty packed with bar shows, Vaudezilla revues, other Burlesque and cabaret revues, and teaching Burlesque classes…Vaudezilla has become ubiquitous in what seems like a short time.  What inspired you to launch Vaudezilla in the first place?

RHA: I’ve worked a lot on film and photo shoots and one of the best things about large-scale projects is the team.  At a photo shoot, you have a stylist, a makeup artist, an assistant, a digital tech person, a photographer — a bunch of people who are experts at their facets of the project.  I wanted to build a team of performers who work really well together and can all play an important part in making larger-scale Chicago Burlesque projects.  So, my partner Dick Dijon and I formed Vaudezilla, and have since added performers like Donna Touch, Wham Bam Pam, Bonny Babs, Maria May I, and Barrett All — all of whom play an integral part in making Vaudezilla the success it is today, both as performers as well as experts in their respective fields.

CSR: Dick Dijon…arguably the luckiest man in Chicago.  At the Big Lebowski Burlesque, he played both The Stranger and Marty.  It looked like he took the electric shears and plowed out a six-inch square out of his own hair to make Marty bald.  That’s commitment, I say.  He works the box office. He co-hosts.  He does tech.  That is just what I can see from a seat in the audience.  What does Dick Dijon officially do? Or is it more appropriate to ask what doesn’t he do?

RHA: Well, Dick Dijon is a dedicated performer and producer.  He’s talented and self-motivated, which makes him invaluable to all of our productions.  By title, he’s the Technical Producer/Director for all of the shows, meaning he really specializes in all things related to tech — lights/sounds/music — and he does almost all of our writing — press releases, as well as skits/bits/shows.  In our relationship, I may be the one who comes up with ideas, but he is the one who figures out how they can actually be done.  Vaudezilla couldn’t exist without Dick Dijon.  It’s simply icing on the cake that he is a fearless performer.  There’s even a rumor that you may see him twirling pasties before the end of the year!

CSR: Spectacular!  Are you currently close to adding any new pieces to your personal repertoire?

RHA: As far as new acts - yes, I’ve got several in the works.  I just debuted a new act called “The Ballad of Red Hot Annie,” which actually features a full-sized hot dog cart and will tell the story of my ascension (depending on how you look at it) from hot dog vendor to Burlesque dancer.  Vaudezilla is also proud to sponsor Viva La Muerte’s “The Wall” where I will putting together a special act to Pink Floyd’s “Hey You.”  And finally, I’m working on a duet with Dick Dijon to an old Broadway standard, where we’ll sing a duet and strip.  Should be fun!

CSR: As a performer, who are your influences?

RHA: As a Burlesque performer, I don’t really have many Burlesque performer influences.  I’ve watched a lot of old Burlesque movies and I attend a lot of shows, but I don’t really think of other performers as being an influence, although I’m sure they are in subtle ways.  I want to be someone who can tell a whole story with my face, so that’s almost always the focus of my pieces — my face — so, if I had to pick someone who inspires me in my burlesque, it would probably be Vaudeville/silent actors like Lucy or Charlie Chaplin.

CSR: Audience members at Vaudezilla shows are given Swag Bags — the grown-up version of the treat bags.  What made you decide to pass these out, and what sort of goodies do they typically contain?

RHA: Well, I really like getting Swag Bags when I go to events, so I wanted to bring a little bit of that to the realm of Burlesque.  We include trinkets like buttons, magnets, candy, stickers, key chains, as well as information about our upcoming shows.  It’s really fun and people get a kick out of what’s in them at every show!

CSR: What performances are coming up next for Red Hot Annie and Vaudezilla?

Red Hot Annie’s Burlesque Calendar:

Every Thursday - Blue Bayou Bartop Burlesque - http://vaudezilla.com/bluebayou.htm

Nov 25 - Ruffle Your Features at Betty’s Blue Star - http://vaudezilla.com/thanksgiving.htm

Nov 27 - BROADZILLA! The Burlesque Beast at Exit - http://vaudezilla.com/broadzilla.htm

Nov 28 - Red Hot Annie @ Beast Women - http://redhotannie.com/img/beastwomen.jpg

Wednesdays through Dec 16 - Learn Burlesque with Red Hot Annie - http://vaudezilla.com/burlesqueclasses.htm

You can find our calendar of events at these pages:

Chicago Burlesque Dancer Red Hot Annie - Calendar of Events & Chicago Burlesque Shows

Vaudezilla Productions - Chicago Burlesque Live Theatrical Burlesque Events in Chicago

Photos by Peter LeGrand and Callie Lipkin.

By J. Scott Hill

Revues are always difficult for me to review.  Whether comedy, burlesque, magic, poetry slam, performance art, or a hodgepodge of everyone’s party pieces, a revue is still a collection of mostly unconnected shorter performances. The fire-eater may be terrific, but the acrobat may be horrific — neither one has anything to do with the other except being in this particular performance space on this particular evening. For the opening night of the Beast Women 2009 Winter Series, my first temptation was to write twelve fifty-word reviews and loosely frame them with a little narrative - to write a revue of reviews to review this revue.  That would just miss the mark.

Every show in the 2009 Winter Series will feature a different lineup and mix of performers.  Opening night saw eleven acts: three songstresses, three stand-up comedians, two burlesque dancers, two monologists, and a belly dancer. Co-founder Michelle Power served as Emcee with a fervent earnestness that is lacking and sorely needed by most hosts of WTTW pledge drives: when Power passed the hat at the end of the night, people wanted to donate.

Virginia Marie’s act combined singing, modern dance, a martial arts staff, and the dialect of a Dickensian street urchin: she was intimidating, without being off-putting.  Claire Wellin sang two original compositions a cappella — one of which (”Not Necessarily, but True”) could well pass for an old standard.

The standout songstress was Jen Stjarna, who performed an excerpt of the Eagles classic “Desperado” along with her original compositions.  Her downtrodden lyrics — about a summer in her aunt’s house where plastic slipcovers shroud everything, or about the elusiveness of everlasting love — make an interesting counterpoint to her upbeat melodies.  Tori Amos is an obvious and strong influence here.  Breathy, better-than-slogging her way through with an obvious cold, and terrific on the keyboards, Stjarna’s future as a recording artist is full of promise.

Stand-up comedian Leslie Lee gave a Rusty Warren-type performance, focusing almost exclusively on boobs.  Janet Kane’s performance style was straight-up old school stand-up.

Bridget Clymore was unusual.  Her patter was a bit chattery, and at times she seemed to lose her way in the maze of her tangents and asides, but her material was an adventure in uncharted territory.  Spinning dysfunction into blissful yarns about the uncertain paternity of her children, the magical powers of Kahlua, and learning to leverage her most valuable asset, Clymore took the audience on a gleefully bizarre ride through her life and brain.

Belly dancer Mahira demonstrated her muscular control.  Fan dancer Lily White Sass, AKA Deb Webb, showed off her flawless figure in scanty showgirl garb.

Burlesque dancer Lola Getz amazed the audience with her glowing red tethered orbs.  Somewhere between yo-yo tricks and a ribbon dance, Lola Getz performed dexterous feats of languid neon beauty while simultaneously removing what little clothing she was wearing — both astounding and titillating.

Monologist Roberta Miles reminisced about her promiscuous youth in a style like Jean Shepard writing a letter to “Penthouse Forum.”

The real centerpiece of this show was Co-Founder Jillian Erickson’s monologue as a prostitute contemplating a career change over a glass of wine.  Funny and moving, surprising in its depth and unflinching in its honesty, Erickson’s performance was a clarion note of triumph over adversity through sheer force of will.

Jillian Erickson’s performance stands as an overarching metaphor for the Beast Women 2009 Winter Series, and for the Beast Women in general.  Over and over again — in the program, on their website, in other publicity materials — Beast Women acknowledges that they are dedicated to “celebrating freedom, sexuality, life oddities, and primal strength found in all women.”  This collection of twelve liberated, sexy, bizarre, powerful women in performance holds together as more than just a dozen individual mini-shows.  This is a menagerie of Beasties barely contained by the venue.  While some of the performers are still gaining confidence and polish, the Beast Women 2009 Winter Series delivers a greatly enjoyable attack by some of the best variety acts in town.

3 STARS

(“Beast Women 2009 Winter Series” runs Saturdays at 10:30 PM, through December 19^th at PROP THTR, 3502 N. Elston Ave. Chicago, IL. $15 (at the door), for information and lineups, call 773-278-1212)

www.beastwomenproductions.com

Beast Women photos by Hunter Matthews.

By J. Scott Hill

The breezes have turned cold and the fall color is past its peak; snow will come before long. Every year at this time, I try to find the perfect holiday pageant or cabaret or spectacular: somewhere to take family and friends to fill them with festive feelings of the holiday season — pure entertainment, part of an evening of good fellowship and liberal consumption of holiday cheer.

The holiday I mean is, of course, Halloween.  For Halloween this year, Porchlight Music Theatre may be giving Chicago the perfect evening of frightening festivities.  It’s macabre! It’s cabaret! Just like the teleportation experiment gone terrifyingly wrong in The Fly, these two elements have been mashed-up together to create the killer chimera Macabaret!

The show opens upon a lifeless set upon a dim stage. A ghoul, like an acolyte to some denizen of the Underworld, makes a procession of one across the stage lit by his solitary candle. The set hints at the abandoned mansions of Universal horror movies of the 1930s and 40s with all of the furniture shrouded in white sheets. The creeping creep makes his way upstage to a grand piano where he ceremoniously places his candlestick, somberly sits, and begins to play — not “Toccata and Fugue” or any other chilling canticle; rather, we hear what sounds like the opening vamp of “Willkommen” from Cabaret.

L. Walter Stearns directs a wonderful ensemble of fine vocalists through songs, recitations, and sketches.  Every member of this cast displays monstrous talent.

Virginia Brazier plays the anemic Victoria Bledsoe.  At times she seems meek and ancillary, only to explode into the forefront, seemingly out of nowhere.  She has the entire audience in apoplectic fits of laughter during two of her numbers.

Steven Rader plays Paul Bearer, the most comical of the choir of cabaret cadavers.  As an actor, Rader is a fantastic active listener, without stealing focus. In doing so, he accentuates the strengths within others’ performances.  Rader is delightfully goofy twanging through a country music parody, and is absolutely chilling when performing a poem about werewolves.

Heather Townsend is tall and lank and perfectly punk as Maude Lynn, yet when she sings she brings a hot sultriness that is unexpected.  She is a particularly sympathetic rotter in her duet “I’m Going Green,” a song about the ultimate act of recycling.

Rachel Quinn looks like a dancer out of Chicago or Sweet Charity or Cabaret (replete with the Clara Bow hairdo), but she sings like one of those sinister Sirens who led so many sailors to their demise.  She gives a spirit-raising chair dance while belting out the post-mortem torch song “Ghost of a Chance.”

The Big Bad among these evil dead is the Emcee, Phil Graves, played by Cameron Brune.  Brune’s voice is the strongest and the most expressive among a group of singers/actors/performers who could have each carried any show by themselves.  He is especially strong as half of a Vaudeville double on the number “Dead-End Job.”  It is damned hard to be undead and funny.  It is a damned sight harder to be undead and unfunny while seeming to really try to be funny but failing on an epic scale — and being truly funny in that enterprise.  Confused?  Cameron Brune wasn’t.  He sold the try and sold the fail and, with an impressive co-conspirator in that Great Reactor Steven Rader, Brune was so damned funny that I kept swallowing air trying just to breathe through my laughter.

Rob Hartmann and Scott Keys have written a selection of mostly humorous, always clever spooky show tunes. The three or four more serious numbers truly are haunting.  This is songwriting at its tightest and most clever.

See Macabaret…IF YOU DARE!   Miss this infinitely enjoyable Halloween treat…AT YOUR OWN RISK!!!  This is a ridiculous and sublime way to celebrate this haunted holiday season.

4 STARS

(“Macabaret” runs through November 1, at Theatre Building Chicago, 1225 W. Belmont Ave. 773-327-5252)

Current Season | Porchlight Music Theatre, Chicago

By J. Scott Hill

As a straight boy coming of age in the south suburbs in the 1980s, I knew exactly one thing about how to get a date: ask her to go see Second City. Lead with Second City, not the “date”:

DUDE: Hi Heather, Karen, Julie, Tammy, or Michelle. Will you go to Second City with me next Saturday…

CHICK: Second City? Tubular!

DUDE: …on a date?

CHICK: Oh! [ponders] Hmmm. [ponders more] OK Kevin, Jim, Steve, Tommy, or Craig. Sometimes you just gotta say, “What the heck,” and make your move…

We understood the relationship between Second City and Saturday Night Live. This became the gauge of an active social life: if you knew the in-jokes from SNL, then you obviously spent your Saturday nights home alone, but if you recognized one of those last few names Don Pardo would read at the end of SNL’s opening credits (one of the “…and featuring” names), then you must have been in with the cool kids. So, if you wanted a second date, then for the first date you wandered through Bizarre Bazaar (and prayed she got all sexy-sexy with any one of a number of fetish items), took her to dinner at the Fireplace Inn (and prayed she got all sexy-sexy eating her saucy, sticky ribs), walked up the street a couple of doors to the Fudge Pot (and prayed she got all sexy-sexy eating her chocolate Hancock Building on-a-stick), if she smoked you walked up the street another couple of doors to the Up Down Tobacco Shop and bought her a pack of parti-colored Sobranie Cocktail cigarettes with the gold-foiled filters (and prayed she got all sexy-sexy French inhaling), and finally you crossed North Avenue and took her to see Second City (and prayed she got all sexy-sexy after guzzling half a dozen zombies).

Studs Terkel’s Not Working at Second City e. t. c. is, above all, hysterically funny — a revue that will make your date happy they came out to see a show with you.  The ensemble is tight. It is bittersweet that the northwest corner of North and Wells is but a layover on the journey to stardom. See these actors here in Chicago while you can; several of them will be working for either Conan O’Brien or Lorne Michaels before the decade is out.

At a Second City revue, I love the surprise, the discovery of just what in the world is going to come next.  I will try to keep from revealing here much about the content of the sketches to afford you the same pleasure when you heed my advice and go see Studs Terkel’s Not Working.

At the performance I attended, one standout among the outstanding ensemble was a replacement player whose blurb was not preprinted in the program (though that evening’s entire cast had their blurbs printed on the addendum).  It is not clear whether Joey Bland is an understudy or has been recast in the role, but his presence energized the entire production.

Fresh off a long and successful run as the titular character in Second City e. t. c.’s Rod Blagojevich Superstar!, Bland gives a spicy performance, unrecognizable without that rotten cat-corpse of a wig he wore all those months in the brutal send-up of the former governor.  Without the hair hat, Bland looks, at a glance, like Brendan Fraser — much to the surprise of anyone who saw him as Blago.  His impishness and high enthusiasm really help stir the audience every bit as much as the pitcher upon pitcher of Goose Island 312.

Another highlight of this ensemble is Beth Melewski.  Years ago, the late Phil Hartman said that actresses are more strongly typecast than are actors: the girl-next-door, the slut, the virgin, the best friend, etc.  Hartman lauded fellow SNL alum Jan Hooks for being an excellent “utility player” –- able to handle portraying the vixen and the queen dork in rapid succession.  Melewski proves just as versatile.  She wows as a 1940s-style screen vixen, having only moments earlier been convincing (or possibly unconvincing) as a questionably transgendered prostitute at an undeterminable place along the surgical progression.

The brightest and most brilliant star in Studs Terkel’s Not Working is Timothy Edward Mason.  I resist describing the characters he creates for fear of spoiling the surprises and with them spoiling a large part of the fun.  Without giving much away, one sketch takes place on the upper deck of a double-decker bus during a sightseeing tour; the character Mason creates for this sketch is one of the most unbreathably funny and original characters I have seen since Rachel Dratch’s plus-sized avenger in Promise Keepers, Losers Weepers at Second City Mainstage a decade ago.  In addition, Mason led the audience-participation theater games-type sketches; Del Close would squee for joy at these well-constructed improv games, since their inclusion in the revue confirms Second City’s admission that improv can be art unto itself, not merely a tool for writing.  One of these sketches is a hard-boiled noir detective story, and Timothy Edward Mason as the hack pulp writer/narrator has the entire audience transfixed upon his every word, and runs a few privileged audience members around the theatre looking for clues in ten minutes of comedic bliss.

Studs Terkel’s Not Working is a whole lot of fun.  Come to see Joey Bland, Beth Melewski, and the phenomenal Timothy Edward Mason before we lose them to New York or Los Angeles.  Come to laugh really hard, and maybe even get to improvise.

Bring a date: the tried and true formula still works like a charm.

3 ½ STARS

(“Studs Terkel’s Not Working” has an open run at The Second City e.t.c. Theatre, 1608 North Wells Street, 2nd Floor of Piper’s Alley. 312-337-3992)

The Second City | Chicago | Chicago e.t.c.

Photo Essay by Tracey J. & J. Scott Hill

Halloween All Year Long with WildClaw Theatre

By Venus Zarris

As if “Bringing Horror and the Supernatural to the Chicago Stage” isn’t good enough, why not ice that creepy cake with a beer swilling Zombie Baby?

Or perhaps a scorekeeping Zombie Dude? This was just some of freakish fun to be had last month when WildClaw Theatre hosted their second ZOMBIE BOWLING benefit event Zombie Bowling II, The Dawn of the Dude at Timber Lanes Bowling Alley.

WildClaw Theatre is committed to doing the near impossible; that is, creating theater that is genuinely frightening. Not shock-fest haunted houses, but rather real theatrical productions of scripts that take you to the realms of darkness. The dramatic and technical chops are in place and the dedication to this mission is scary serious. But the great folks at WildClaw are just as enthusiastic about having fun.

Chicago Stage Review writer J. Scott Hill and award-winning horror writer Tracey J. Hill decided to make a date night with WildClaw and the ZOMBIES. They attended the event and documented their own macabre personal transformations!

They also relished in the sheer joy of playtime with the foxy undead.

There is something extraordinary about looking around a bowling alley and seeing at least 50% of the patrons in various stages of delightful decomposition. (especially when it is NOT on or around October 31st!)

This was the warning sign in the window at Timber Lanes. It indicated that the alley had been taken over by fun loving ghouls but your flesh didn’t have to be decomposing to join in on the good time as WildClaw Theatre creates Halloween All Year Long, both on and off stage!

Monday October 5, @ 8:00PM,  WildClaw takes over the haunted Music Box Theater with DEATHSCRIBE 2009, The 2nd Annual International Festival of Radio Horror Plays. Don’t miss this brilliant opportunity to start off your Halloween festivities early by hearing the new works of gifted horror writers produced by this frighteningly talented theater company!

For more info go to WildClaw Theatre - Bringing Horror and the Supernatural to the Chicago Stage

or DEATHSCRIBE 2009 opening @ The Music Box - Chicago Stage Review

ZOMBIE BOWLING event photos by Tracey J. & J. Scott Hill.

Check out these Halloween related ChicagoStageReview Features:

Halloween Plays 2009! - Chicago Stage Review

Stories from a Haunted Stage - Chicago Stage Review

FEAR ON STAGE - Chicago Stage Review

DESTROY ALL MONSTERS - Chicago Stage Review

Images of a Haunting Stage - Chicago Stage Review