Items filtered by date: November 2007

Lou (Cher Álvarez) and James (Patrick Heusinger) are in their bedroom. They are so focused on each other that they don’t notice the flashing light in the bedroom down the hall. The catch? Lou and James are the only ones in the house. So that leaves the question – who is controlling the flashing lights?

Many of us are familiar with this moment in a horror film. The first scare is crucial and sets us up for what we are about to experience. We may not know exactly what is happening, but we do know that this simple game with the lights suggests that all is not quite normal in this house. Lou and James are not alone, and whether or not we are ready, we are soon going to learn what is keeping them company.

However, this is not a film. This is a horror play, and while the moment provides a similar purpose, you might find that the experience is quite different. Gasps could be heard across the house at this particular performance. Looking around, folks were pointing to fellow audience members – making sure that they too took in the flashing lights. Whispers could be heard, and suddenly, it felt like we were part of the performance. As the scares grew over the course of the piece, reactions only intensified. Audience members shouted, screamed, and even at times tried to warn the characters of what they were clearly missing. Director Felix Barrett and his design team skillfully create what might feel like an immersive experience. As the tension on stage grew, I personally could feel the same happening to the audience surrounding me. To put it simply – we were hooked, and there was no escape until we finally got our answers.

Writing by Levi Holloway, Paranormal Activity follows married couple James and Lou who move from Chicago to London to escape their dark past. We slowly learn that their previous home was haunted, and they assumed that a full ocean could make that go away. However, they soon discover that it’s not always a place that is haunted. Sometimes it’s people, and whether or not they are ready, it’s time to confront their past before it’s too late.

That which truly pushes the experience over the top is the work of Illusions Designer Chris Fisher – along with the collaboration of Associate Illusions Designer Daniel Weissglass and Illusions Consultant Skylar Fox. The stage magic is often hard to grasp with how authentic it feels, and you may find yourself wondering if you even believe what is in front of you – much like the characters on stage.

We witness the couple at the center slowly unravel – particularly James. As with so many horror stories, he begins as a non-believer. As the ghostly interactions become harsher and harder to avoid, we see him question everything he ever knew. Both Álvarez and Heusinger perform quite a feat. As we witness their marriage completely fall apart at the mercy of the hauntings, you might find yourself feeling sorry for the genuine relationship they so clearly set up at the beginning.

With haunting stage magic and a story that takes no prisoners, Paranormal Activity is not just a play – this is an event. Fans of the horror genre will not be disappointed. This is an experience that keeps you guessing from the moment the curtain rises to the last glimmer of light at its conclusion.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Run Time: 2 hours, with intermission

Paranormal Activity runs through November 2 at Chicago Shakespeare Theater – 800 E. Grand Avenue.

TimeLine Theatre opens its 29th season with the world premiere of Hundreds and Hundreds of Stars, a deeply personal and politically charged play written by and starring Sandra Delgado. Under the careful direction of Kimberly Senior, the production folds an intimate family drama into the broader context of immigration under the Obama administration — a time when the tension between belonging and legality became a defining national paradox.

Delgado plays Clara, a woman whose life reads like a quintessential American story: educated in U.S. schools, an unemployed professional, a mother, an ex-wife paying alimony, and the devoted caretaker of her aging, recently widowed father. Yet, she carries one crucial distinction — Clara was born in Mexico. In the eyes of the government, despite her decades of living and contributing to the United States, she exists in a fragile legal limbo. It is this tension — between a lived sense of home and the precarity of status — that fuels Delgado’s heartfelt and sometimes haunting narrative.

The story unfolds in 2015, the final years of the Obama administration, when the nation’s immigration policy embodied contradictions. While Obama extended compassion through programs like DACA, his administration also deported more immigrants than any before it. It’s within that fraught atmosphere that Clara’s life unravels. As she plans an overseas trip, a bureaucratic hiccup exposes a youthful misstep from her past, threatening her livelihood, family, and even her right to remain in the country she calls home. What follows is both a bureaucratic nightmare and a spiritual reckoning, as Clara gazes skyward — toward “hundreds and hundreds of stars” — seeking guidance, belonging, and deliverance.

Senior’s direction is restrained and elegant, allowing Delgado’s writing to shimmer through the emotional and political layers of the story. The ensemble’s performances are uniformly grounded and generous. Ramón Camin gives Papi, Clara’s father, a stoic dignity — a man bound by nostalgia yet dependent on his daughter to navigate his new reality. Joshua David Thomas brings humor and restless charm to Ruben, Clara’s cousin, who juggles nursing school and low-level marijuana dealing with a kind of defiant optimism. Charlotte Arias’s Stella, Clara’s tween daughter with dreams of Paris, radiates a mix of giddy excitement at learning a new language and the tender angst of adolescence, embodying a generation eager to explore the world yet uncertain of their place within it. Charin Alvarez, playing every other woman in Clara’s orbit — from her attorney to her mother — threads the production together with wit, wisdom, and warmth.

Visually, the production achieves a graceful fluidity. Regina Garcia’s open set transforms seamlessly into apartments, offices, and memory spaces with minimal rearrangement, while Christine Binder’s lighting washes scenes in mood and emotion — from sterile bureaucratic glare to dreamlike luminescence. Willow James’s sound design and music further enrich the experience, grounding the play’s political urgency in emotional resonance.

Hundreds and Hundreds of Stars succeed because it is not a lecture on immigration policy, but a human portrait drawn from it. Delgado reminds us that behind every policy statistic — behind every deportation — lies a web of families, debts, dreams, and love stories. Clara’s story is one of endurance and faith, a meditation on identity and the invisible lines that divide “citizen” from “other.” In blending the personal and the political, TimeLine Theatre has once again illuminated how history lives — and aches — within the human heart.

Highly Recommended

When: Through November 9th

Where: Lookingglass Theatre, 163 E. Pearson Street

Running time: 90 minutes

Tickets: $40 - $95

(773)-287-8463

www.Timelinetheatre.com

Goodman Theatre launches its 2025/26 season at the Owen with Revolution(s), a world premiere musical that thunders with urgency and defiance. Written by Zayd Ayers Dohrn—2016 Horton Foote New American Play Prize winner and son of Bill Ayers, co-founder of the Weather Underground—the play carries the weight of history and the pulse of rebellion. With music by Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave fame and direction by Steve H. Broadnax III, Revolution(s) explodes onto the stage as both a call to arms and a meditation on generational resistance.

Dohrn’s daring script weaves two timelines into one charged narrative. In 1989, African-American veteran Leon (Al’Jaleel McGhee) and his quick-thinking, idealistic wife Emma (Jackie Burns) find themselves fugitives, forced to flee with their newborn twin sons. Their flight captures the uneasy tension of a generation torn between paranoia and hope—a time when the dream of revolution still felt urgent and within reach. Fast forward to 2016, and those twins, now adults, grapple with the legacy their parents left behind. Hampton (Aaron James McKenzie), scarred by his service in Afghanistan, abandons his post and returns to Chicago’s South Side and to Lucia (Alysia Velez), his undocumented girlfriend who anchors him to a fragile sense of home. His brother Ernie (Jakiem Hart), once a prodigy on the guitar, has withdrawn from both his talent and the world—until Hampton’s unraveling forces him to confront the very past he’s been avoiding.

Broadnax directs with a ferocity that mirrors the play’s title, blending moments of tenderness and chaos with cinematic precision. He builds scenes that combust with tension and intimate ache, often within the same breath. The design work—gritty projections, steel scaffolding, and stark, rhythmic lighting—evokes both the bunker of a warehouse and the battlefield. There’s an immediacy here: revolution is not a metaphor, but a lived inheritance.

(L-R) Jakeim Hart and Aaron James McKenzie in Revolution(s).

Then there’s the music—pure Morello. The score, straight from the Rage Against the Machine playbook, fuses electric rebellion with spiritual yearning. Songs like “Battle Sirens,” “Hold the Line,” and “Whatever It Takes” roar as anthems of resistance, while “Rise to Power” and “Promenade” reveal unexpected warmth and vulnerability. The songs don’t so much advance the narrative as expand it, offering philosophical texture instead of plot propulsion. In Revolution(s), music is both protest and prayer—an act of survival.

What happens when the spirit of rebellion is passed down like trauma? What does it mean to inherit both resistance and loss? Revolution(s) suggests that revolution isn’t merely an act—it’s a legacy, coded into the body like memory or pain. Leon and Emma’s defiance becomes both a beacon and a burden for their sons, who carry the scars of a fight they didn’t choose but can’t escape. For Hampton, rebellion manifests as a restless need to confront authority—even when the war he’s fighting is within himself. For Ernie, it’s the refusal to participate, a quieter but no less radical protest against expectation. The play’s most haunting insight is that revolution reshapes generations; its victories inspire, but its wounds linger.

Dohrn’s writing captures this duality with compassion and fury, showing that to inherit rebellion is to inherit a question—how do you keep fighting without becoming consumed by the fire your parents lit?

Revolution(s) is a work of conviction—raw, restless, and unapologetically alive. It asks hard questions about legacy, freedom, and what we’re willing to sacrifice for change. In a cultural moment of complacency by our elected representatives, Revolution(s) doesn’t just remind us of what rebellion sounds like—it dares us to remember why it matters.

Highly Recommended

When: Through Nov. 16th
Where: Goodman Theater (170 N. Dearborn)
Tickets: $34-$104
Info: goodmantheatre.org

*This review is also shared on https://www.theatreinchicago.com/!  

“What happens if we never loosen our grip?”

Director Mikael Burke ends his director’s note with the question above. He muses on the responsibilities of parents, and how all we want is to keep our children safe. We hold them close to keep them from harm, but ultimately, what does that do? Does it keep them safe? Or if we hold them too close, does the choice send them in the opposite direction – running towards any sense of freedom that they can find?

However, you might find that Burke’s question sheds light on a little more than just the role of parents in the play. What happens if we never loosen our grip on our children, but also our fears? Our insecurities? Our unhappiness, or even the dreams we once held so close? You might find that Burke’s question leads to another – If we never loosen our grip, how are we ever meant to grow and find something bigger?

Written by Terry Guest, Oak takes place in the south where we meet three young black people – Pickle (Jazzy Rush), Suga (Stephanie Mattos), and Big Man (Donovan Session). There is a town-wide curfew of 7pm during snatching season – the time of year where no child is safe. Every parent tightens their hold a bit more – including Peaches (Brianna Buckley), a single mother who just wants to know that her kids will be home when she gets back from her late-night job. Is it a mysterious Creek Monster that is to blame? Or is there something even darker afoot? All we know is that children are going missing, and no one really knows where to turn.

Helmed by Burke, the creative team brings this play to haunting life with what can only be described as superb talent. Scenic Designer Sydney Lynne completely transforms the stage – with a swamp filled with dead trees that immediately plants the audience in this southern gothic mystery. Lighting Designer Eric Watkins certainly does not hold back – taking full advantage of darkness and shadows that heighten the spooky feel. Especially when combined with Original Music and Sound Designer Ethan Korvne’s work, you might find it tough not to completely let yourself fall into the ghost story unfolding before you. There were quite a few screams at this particular performance, and I know I personally felt the tension rising in my own body as the characters dug deeper in the mysteries surrounding them.

Now, what is it that is so frightening? The scenery certainly does the work to invite the audience into the story. The ensemble as a whole is quite strong – particularly Rush and Session. The brother/sister relationship they build on stage is incredibly relatable. No one quite gets under your skin like a sibling, but at the same time, no one quite has your back like one either. As we see the two struggle to be honest with each other about how much they might need each other, you might find yourself leaning in – wishing you could help spell it out for them – especially if you yourself are an older sibling. Seeing the stakes and what this family has to lose certainly adds to the fear.

However, more than any of that, Guest writes a story that is unfortunately quite relevant. We see the disappearances of children happen daily. We also see that there are differences in how these disappearances are explored based on who is taken and where they happen to reside. Perhaps Guest’s story is so terrifying because this happens to be the truth in which we live, and we have yet to find a solution.

Oak is the perfect play for a Chicago that is slowly moving into the fall season. As we inch closer to Halloween, maybe we all need a spooky little wakeup call?

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Oak runs through November 9 at Raven Theatre. For tickets and information, see the Raven Theatre website.

*This review is also shared on https://www.theatreinchicago.com/!  

A famous Chicagoan once said “Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” Life does move fast, and opportunities and experiences are the simplest way to pause time. For me there’s no better place in all of Chicago where time stops, even for a short while, than the Lyric Opera. There’s something magical about the venue, from the moment you enter the theatre to marvel at the grandness of the entrance hall until the time the lights blink to usher you to your plush red chairs in the audience to view an operatic masterpiece. It’s when you leave the theatre, wandering into the chilly Chicago night air, that you realize that the opera allowed you to stop time, and not just for the lengthy three plus hour run times the operas tend to be, but truly stop time. Because the magic of the opera allows us to stop, look, and reflect that we watched an opera that has been performed for thousands of years. Plays and operas based on plays and works that reach to the earliest stages of life on earth and that we as a modern audience are still moved by today, can still connect to on an emotional level. Time stops at the opera and for a brief run time, you can view the same operatic magic as the Lyric Opera of Chicago’s 2025/26 Season kicks off with a searing tale of vengeance and betrayal: Cherubini’s Medea, on stage October 11–26, 2025.

Hell hath no fury like a sorceress scorned. Euripides's ancient tragedy comes to blazing life in this riveting opera, a late 18th-century masterpiece with music and themes that continue to resonate across the millennia. This centuries-old tale burns with unrelenting emotional fire, and in Cherubini’s hands, it demands to be retold. Audiences witness the tragedy of Medea, a powerful sorceress betrayed by her lover, Giasone, who abandons her and their two children to marry another woman, Glauce, the daughter of the king Creonte. Given just 24 hours to accept her fate, Medea instead bends it to her will, with her accomplice, Neris, at her side, delivering vengeance that shakes the very foundations of the kingdom. A favorite of Beethoven himself, who considered Cherubini to be the greatest living composer of his time, Medea channels the raw power of Greek tragedy and sets it to unforgettable music, leaving audiences breathless as love curdles into rage, and a mother’s heartbreak becomes her most devastating weapon.

With a cast of operatic Olympians, visionary direction, and music that blazes with wrath and beauty, Medea sets the tone for a season defined by bold storytelling and emotional intensity. Medea marks the return of three Chicago-born international stars to the Lyric stage, superstar soprano Sondra Radvanovsky in an Olympic-level performance of the title role, acclaimed tenor Matthew Polenzani, and the rising star mezzo-soprano Zoie Reams. Coupled with the Lyric Opera Orchestra conducted by “Chicago’s Maestro-Around-Town” Lyric Music Director Enrique Mazzola, Cherubini’s score delivers operatic fire and fury as never before. Lyric presents Medea for the first time in its seven-decade history in a production directed by Sir David McVicar, who returns with a sweeping vision of beauty and decay that commands attention from first note to final breath. This spellbinding production transforms myth into music and passion into fire and creates an unforgettable night at the opera that proves hell hath no fury like a sorceress scorned.

Is there anything more profound or timeless as a woman’s rage? Particularly a woman scorned? It’s quite easy to dive into debates about the merits of female rage, how we can examine ancient texts with an often more critical or kinder lens as we reflect on the story that unfolds on the stage. But more striking is the lasting power of the emotions captured in Medea, rage, vengeance, and spite. The emotions depicted and beautifully portrayed in 2025 are the same emotions that were originally captured when the play was first written in 431 BC, the same emotions depicted as an opera for the first time in 1797 France. It’s the power of the humanities, the way that prose and storytelling capture the human experience of a woman scorned and the lengths she would go to seek her revenge. The same shock and outrage audiences felt on October 11^th, 2025, are the same feelings audience members experienced in 1797, and in 431 BC. That’s the magic of opera. Other theatric mediums offer testaments and homage to classic tales but operas have an altogether unique quality about that. The blend of storytelling and musicality captivates you, enchants you, and transcends you through time and space with drama tales that still resonate today.

There are only five remaining opportunities to see Medea at the Lyrics Opera in Chicago (20 N Wacker Dr, Chicago, IL 60606): October 14, 17, and 20, at 7 p.m., and matinee performances on October 23 and 26 at 2 p.m. The performance is sung in Italian with easy-to-follow English titles projected above the stage and runs for 2 hours and 45 minutes, including one intermission. Life does move pretty fast, I’d wager those n 431 BC and 1797 thought the same thing. So be sure to stop and look around every once in a while and see this incredible opera before it passes you by. For more information and tickets, visit lyricopera.org/medea or call 312.827.5600.

More than a haunted house and not quite a play, the House of the Exquisite Corpse series lives somewhere between immersive theater and a live-action episode of Black Mirror.

For the fifth year in a row, Rough House Theater Co. is haunting Steppenwolf's Merle Reskin Garage Theatre with House of the Exquisite Corpse V: BLOOD & PUPPETS. This production-experience hybrid is unsettling, uncanny, and unlike anything else running in Chicago this Halloween season.

The show consists of six puppet performances, each roughly five minutes long, staged in dark, enclosed rooms. Positioned more as voyeurs than viewers, the audience observes each performance through peepholes cut in the room’s walls and listens through headphones. It’s an experience like no other, immersing you in a world entirely, even as you watch it from the outside.

LETTING -Creators Nina D'Angier & Madigan Burke Puppetteer Amandatron 5000.

Although you may be tempted, as I was, to take this year’s blood-and-puppets theme literally, expecting guts and gore, co-directors Felix Mayes and Corey Smith encouraged artists to explore “blood” more metaphorically. The results are striking. Across the six rooms, blood takes many forms: as a symbol of life, decay, lineage, legacy, intimacy, and rupture. Each room also offers a radically different world. One might transport you to the cluttered lab of a deranged scientist, another to a barren, surveilled interior, another to an eerily windswept desert.

The artistry on display is staggering, extending far beyond set design. Each vignette – created by a different team of artists – interprets the theme in personal and provocative ways, resulting in a thrilling range of styles and techniques. The puppetry alone shifts dramatically from room to room, moving from delicate shadow work to oversized, wearable creatures and full-body figures that act like natural extensions of the performer’s body. Some rooms tell tight, plot-driven stories; others are impressionistic and mood-driven, favoring feeling over narrative. Across the board, the performances are intriguing and deeply theatrical – you might come for the scares, but you’ll stay for the craft.

Of course, none of this would be possible without the collective effort of the full production team. The co-directors have built more than a series of puppet shows: they’ve created a platform for experimentation. Puppetry, an art form that’s far too often dismissed and infantilized, takes center stage in House of the Exquisite Corpse, revealing its full expressive range. A space where this kind of work is possible is rare, and Rough House has built one where artists can be unapologetically weird, bold, and free – a testament to what independent theater can be when creators are trusted to follow their wildest ideas.

Whether you're a horror fan, a regular theatergoer, or just looking for something truly unique to do this spooky season, House of the Exquisite Corpse delivers. It may not make you scream, but it will definitely make you squirm.

House of the Exquisite Corpse V: BLOOD & PUPPETS is haunting The Merle at Steppenwolf Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays through November 1. Tickets are available at https://roughhousetheater.com/house-of-the-exquisite-corpse

Before you go, please note that the experience requires walking and standing for extended periods, as well as the use of over-ear headphones. Rough House is committed to accessibility and has made detailed information and request forms available at https://roughhousetheater.com/accessibility.

*This review is also shared on https://www.theatreinchicago.com/!  

Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman remains one of the most incisive allegories in American drama—a modern tale in which seduction, power, and racial history collide in the confined space of a subway car. Trap Door Theatre’s production, directed with precision and calculated risk by Keith Surney, resurrects the play’s mythic and political undercurrents, deepening its resonance as both ritual and warning.

Baraka titled his 1964 play after the legend of the Flying Dutchman, the ghost ship doomed to sail the seas forever, unable to find port. In Baraka’s interpretation, a subway car becomes that ship—an eternal vessel circling the underworld of American consciousness. The passengers are ghosts of history; the cycle of desire and destruction never ends. Surney underscores the play’s endless cycle of seduction and destruction by dividing Lula among three actresses—Carolyn Benjamin (white dress), Genevieve Corkery (red dress), and Ali Foley (blue dress)—each embodying a different facet of America’s recurring racial performance. Together, they form a chorus of seduction and menace, representing the shifting faces of white America—erotic, violent, and self-possessed. Their presence before the play begins, prowling the stage like sirens holding apples, transforms the theatre into a space of temptation and foreboding.

Surney himself plays Clay, the young Black intellectual aboard this spectral train unaware of his fate. His Clay is both composed and vulnerable—buttoned suit, tie, but no shirt—an image that literalizes the illusion of assimilation stripped of safety. Lula, one at a time, approaches him with the ferocity of predators, their sexuality exaggerated to the edge of discomfort. Surney embraces that discomfort deliberately, making it clear that the erotic tension in Baraka’s play is not merely physical—it is historical, rooted in the dangerous seductions of American liberalism and white desire.

The production’s design reinforces the tension between abstraction and reality. Viscaya Wilson’s bare stage of metal poles offers a skeletal suggestion of a subway car, though it lacks the oppressive grit that defines the New York underground. For a native New Yorker, the environment may not fully convince, yet its sparseness allows the actors’ physical and emotional choreography to dominate the space. Gary Damico’s lighting cuts through the minimalism - isolating bodies in sharp contrast.  The uncredited sound design fills in what the set omits. The deep metallic rumbles immerse the audience in a world both real and hallucinatory, the jazz soundscape itself becoming the heartbeat of Baraka’s infernal train.

At moments, Surney allows erotic interplay to linger past its breaking point, delaying the eruption of Clay’s righteous fury. Yet when that fury finally arrives, the scene ignites with the same volatility that scandalized audiences in 1964. The words still wound; the violence still feels inevitable.

One critic described Baraka’s original Dutchman as “an explosion of hatred,” a reflection of a truth white America could barely confront. Trap Door Theatre’s version does not soften that explosion—it contextualizes it. Baraka’s play is a parable of historical repetition. The subway, like the ghost ship, circles endlessly, carrying the same sins and the same souls. In this staging, Dutchman becomes a ritual exorcism—a reminder that America’s voyage through its own darkness is far from over.

Baraka would soon transform from LeRoi Jones, the bohemian poet of downtown New York, into Amiri Baraka, the militant architect of the Black Arts Movement. Dutchman marks that turning point—a theatrical bridge between personal identity and collective consciousness. Surney’s production captures this moment of awakening, reminding us that Baraka’s rage was never chaos but clarity: a demand that America look into its mirror and recognize the ghost at its shoulder. Trap Door Theatre’s Dutchman sails that ghost ship again, not to escape the curse, but to make us hear, once more, the hum of its unending voyage beneath our feet.

That clarity also defines Keith Surney’s directorial debut, a bold and fearless entry that takes genuine risks—some raw, some revelatory— announcing a director unafraid to challenge both text and audience. If Dutchman is a voyage into the heart of America’s contradictions, Surney steers it with both daring and intellect. I’ll be looking to see more of him in the future.

Highly Recommended

When: Through October 25

Where: Trapdoor Theatre, 1655 W Cortland St, Chicago

Running time: 50 minutes

Tickets: $22

773-384-0494

https://www.trapdoortheatre.com

Jojo Jones’ “Veal,” premiering at A Red Orchid Theatre in Old Town, is among the recent wave of plays set in a post-apocalyptic near future - the better to show how core social values and structures might play out for individuals placed abruptly in a clean-slate setting. The increasing frequency with which this plot line appears on stages and screens tells us much about the trending thoughts of playwrights, who likely are voicing societal angst about the state of things - and reasonably so.

Directed by dado, the apocalypse in “Veal” is loosely defined but certainly political in nature, a revolution that has reset things. We do know this much: it has resulted in the character Chelsea (well played by Alexandra Chopson) to be installed as Queen of North America. That simple fact packs loads of information: that the U.S., Mexican, and Canadian governments have fallen, their respective Constitutions trashed, and a monarch now rules.

That Queen Chelsea is likely a despotic type is suggested immediately by her regal demeanor in royal array, on a throne, and by her side a servant, Unnamed Male Concubine (Jasper Johnson) who sits silently a step below. When Chelsea descends from her throne to walk upon the floor below her, the silent Concubine unbidden gets on his hands and knees, and with infinite care wipes up the floor where Chelsea has trodden, then resumes his vigil on the step below.

Soon enough three characters arrive: Franny (Jojo Brown), Lulu (Carmia Imani) and Noa (Alice Wu), all of whom were in middle school with Chelsea 13 years ago. In fact, we learn, this setting is the very middle school they attended, a place this monarch has chosen as the site for her palace. She has resurfaced the floor with imported marble and demolished the gym.

“My advisers kept telling me to use the White House, but I’d never been there,” Chelsea lets her classmates know, and they all offer obsequities as they converse with her. Their fear and trepidation is palpable as they try to avoid taboo subjects or potentially incite Chelsea's anger.

“The Revolution was weird,” offers Franny, as Chelsea benevolently asks if they are hungry, then orders her Concubine to provide a repast for the visitors. This ends up being Lunchables that are 13 years past their expiration date, still sitting from their school days. This tips us off that Queen Chelsea harbors some resentments from those days.

Gingerly, they decline the food, except for LuLu, who having allowed that she was hungry, is now ordered to eat, and Chelsea shows her tyrannical side. After this set-to subsides, Franny reveals the reason for this visit: to petition the Queen of North America for medicine for her sister and she begins gingerly on her sibling’s behalf. “We all knew you would be successful,” Franny says of their middle school days. “But Queen of North America?!”

After that, a bit more groveling. “The revolution - huge fan - kinda messed up the supply chain,” Franny says, and lets Queen Chelsea know she cannot find insulin for her sister, a Type 1 diabetic, to which Chelsea replies, indirectly, that she is always being asked for things.

“You know, it is so hard. I keep getting people telling me I’m like Nero, or Caligula.” Though the subject of “Veal” is completely absorbing, every now and then I found myself thinking of current events and another despot who rules by whim, and loves to surround himself with sycophants.

As the action advances, Queen Chelsea dispatches the Unknown Male Concubine to look into insulin availability, but signals there will be a price to pay, and the play moves into territory somewhere between “Mean Girls” and “Carrie.” The dramatic tension hinges on whether and how much Queen Chelsea’s former classmates will debase themselves in the hopes of securing the insulin for Franny’s sister. Queen Chelsea forces them to re-enact the classroom scenes in which she suffered their bullying and ostracism. But eventually the trio reaches a limit, each on their own terms, and ultimately Queen Chelsea tires of the game.

The performances are really excellent, especially Alice Wu as Noa, and Jojo Brown, who does the lion's share of the dramatic heavy lifting as Franny. Accolades for the most intriguing character go to Jasper John as the Unknown Male Concubine, a largely silent role with huge stage presence.

“Veal” runs through November 9, 2025 at A Red Orchid Theatre, 1531 N. Wells in Chicago.

Those familiar with The Lion King will recognize the opening cords of “Circle of Life.” Rafiki (Mukelisiwe Goba) enters and as she sings, the animals begin to take their places on the stage. Zebras. Birds. Cheetahs. Gazelles. And of course, lions.

However, what is especially magical about this Disney musical is that the animals are not simply costumed actors. Director Julie Taymor, in collaboration with Michael Curry, takes theatricality to a whole new level through their puppet designs. Larger than life creations not only take the stage, but even the aisles. As giraffes and elephants walked down through the house at this performance, cheers erupted, and gasps could be heard from audience members of all ages. You may even find yourself wondering how actors could control a puppet so intricate – especially while climbing stairs to get to the stage.

Many of us are familiar with The Lion King in some way. The original movie was released in 1994, and I know I personally have lost count of how many times I have seen it. However, you might just find that no matter how well you know the story, Taymor and her team managed to transform it into something completely unique as they brought it to life. No matter where one looks on stage, there is always something exquisite to take in – whether it's a new puppet, backdrop, or something in between. It’s no surprise that this piece won 6 Tony Awards with its original production – including Best Musical.

"The Lion King” is now playing at Cadillac Palace.

Like the Disney movie, The Liong King begins with Young Simba (Bryce Christian Thompson and Julian Villela, depending on the performance).  Full of rambunctious energy, his father, Mufasa (David D’Lancy Wilson) tries to prepare him to one day take over as King. However, when his father suffers from an untimely death, Simba runs away – where he finds new friends Timon (Robert Creighton) and Pumba (Danny Grumich) who teach him a very different, more relaxed way of life. As much as he loves basking in this new perspective over the years, an older Simba (Gilbert Domally) eventually realizes he must return home to Pride Rock and take on the responsibilities he at one time left behind.

With music and lyrics by Elton John and Tim Rice, the award-winning score features famous hits including “I Just Can’t Wait to Be King,” “Hakuna Matata,” “Can You Feel the Love Tonight,” and “Be Prepared.” The ensemble as a whole is strong – in particular Domally and Thembelihle Cele as Nala. You might find that their “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” is full of heart, and a sweetness that left the audience almost silent as it ended.

At the root, The Lion King is a story about legacy, and the idea that loved ones live on within us. “He Lives in You (Reprise)” marks an especially breathtaking moment in the musical when Simba realizes that while his father is gone, his spirit is still very much alive. Scenic Designer Richard Hudson and Lighting Designer Donald Holder collaborate to transform the space with a full constellation of stars. As the ensemble sings and the theater is consumed with the gorgeous, but haunting harmonies, you might find yourself starting to become lost in the beauty of it all - much like Simba. Perhaps in a world that often feels lost in the chaos these days, there is even more necessary space for a story that encourages us to find the light.

With stunning design, a powerhouse ensemble, and a story full of hope, The Lion King remains a story that surpasses the test of time. Whether you are a long-time fan or introducing a child to the musical for the first time, there is a little magic for everyone.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

The Lion King runs through October 19 at the Cadillac Palace Theater. For tickets and information, see the Broadway in Chicago website.

Walking into the Courtyard Theater for Rome Sweet Rome, you might find it’s impossible not to be taken aback by the design. College Pollard’s Scenic Design astounds – particularly with the large replica Michaelangelo’s sculpture the David at the center. The catch? The statue is featured from behind, giving the audience a prime view of the David’s backside for the entire performance. Especially when combined with Lighting Designer Jesse Klug’s bright, flashing lights and Jax and Composer Jeffrey JQ Qiayum’s invitation to get up and dance to the bumping mix blasting through the speakers, space sets the audience up for two things:

1. This play clearly takes place in some version of Rome.
2. Nothing can quite prepare the audience for the event that they are about to experience.

The Q Brothers Collective’s Rome Sweet Rome is an adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, but with quite a few twists – including a full 90s hip-hop soundtrack and fun, top-notch choreography from Tanji Harper. The production is a party from the moment the lights come up, and looking around at the audience surrounding me at this performance, it was clear everyone was ready to lean in.

Caesar (POS), the charismatic tyrant at the center, carries a strong hold over Rome. He continues to pass increasingly absurd laws out of fear of losing that control. When Caesar makes the decision to outlaw bread, a select group decides it’s time to take action. Cash (Jonathan Shaboo), Brutus (Victor Musoni), and Casca (Danielle Davis) decide to stage a coup and take him down. The question is, will they succeed? Can they bring bread back to Rome before it’s too late?

Janyce Caraballo (center) with the company of Rome Sweet Rome at Chicago Shakespeare Theater, a wild and satirical new “add-rap-tation” of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar from Q Brothers Collective (GQ, JQ, JAX, and POS). September 23-October 19, 2025, in the Courtyard Theater.

It’s not hard to miss the political undertones beneath. A power-hungry ruler at the center who continues to grasp at power in any way he can. This theme is present in the original source material and certainly makes its way into the adaptation. We continue to see history repeating itself. Greedy rulers leave voids for those just like them to take their place – often times more paranoid than the last and grasping even harder at whatever they can.

However, the Q Brothers do their work to carry the story further into today. In a key moment when Brutus turns to the audience and instead, makes it about us. The lights in the audience come up and he pointedly asks if this is what we want. Do we want to murder him? Do we see the trends and do we want to change them?  Musoni certainly builds a chemistry with the audience in this moment, and you might find it’s easy to allow the fourth wall to come down and begin to engage in the dialogue. Though a little on the nose, the message acts as a helpful reminder that these stories are more timely than ever. Perhaps we can all do with a little “on the nose” as we continue to navigate what to do next in this political climate.

Full of a pizazz and a poignant message, Rome Sweet Rome has a little something for everyone. Whether you are a die-hard Shakespeare fan or this is your first time with the material, the Q Brothers make Julius Caesar accessible, and even invite us to take a little accountability along the way.

RECOMMENDED

Rome Sweet Rome runs through October 19, 2025 at Chicago Shakespeare Theater. For tickets and information, see the Chicago Shakespeare Theater website.

*This review is also shared on https://www.theatreinchicago.com/!