Items filtered by date: November 2007

‘Andy Warhol in Tehran’ is a delight, an incisive comedy packaged with a serious exploration of art, history, and political values.

Rob Lindley as Warhol captures the artist exactly as he was seen in his public persona, somewhat vapid, seemingly desultory, with a passion for attaching to others’ fame, while amplifying his own. The script by Persian-American playwright Brent Askari gives a knowing monologue delivered with droll deadpan humor by Lindley, providing an entertaining overview of Warhol’s background and his work.

Warhol, who died in 1987 and coined that timeless phrase “15 minutes of fame,” rose to a far more lasting version of it by turning the mundane—Campbell’s Soup Cans, celebrity photos, a five-hour film of someone sleeping—into highly coveted and admired pop art.

Cultivating his own celebrity, he leveraged that as well to boost the price tags on his canvases, his access to well-heeled collectors and famous personalities, ultimately driving demand for commissioned work—which is where the play opens.

Having tapped out other gambits, Warhol in his late career took aim at portraiture of world leaders, reasoning they would need numerous versions of portraits for multiple public spaces. It is just such a commission, for the Empress of Persia, that finds Warhol in Tehran. Lindley’s Warhol, as voiced by the script, keeps us engaged throughout this fast-paced disquisition on Warhol’s background when there comes a knock on the door: room service.

Enter Farhad (Hamid Dehghani), in a gold braided bellhop jacket rolling a cart laden with caviar—and to Warhol’s delight, just $10 a serving. A few moments in, we find this is not just any hotel staffer, but a dissident impersonating a staffer. He aims to take Warhol hostage, in an effort to draw attention to the Iranian dissidents' efforts to remove the repressive Shah of Iran—placed in office by Western governments when the very popular and democratically elected president tried to nationalize Iranian oil, particularly Anglo-Persian Oil.

Warhol, as an artist and particularly with his focus on capturing ephemeral moments and celebrities, had no awareness or even interest in politics in Iran, or anywhere else. Farhad, holding a gun, declares, “We are going to announce we have kidnapped the famous Andy Warhol.”

“Why me?” Warhol says, suggesting Farhad kidnap another hotel guest, Barry Goldwater. “He’s very handsome.”
“What does that have to do with anything,” Farhod snaps back, seemingly infuriated by Warhol’s nonchalance and disengagement with the seriousness of his situation. Warhol was chosen, “Because you’re the most decadent artist alive. You see, Andy Warhol, we want our 15 minutes of fame.”

As the two wait for the getaway van, the playwright uses the dialog to reveal the characters. While the fictional kidnap attempt never happened, everything else about Warhol’s background, including the visit to Tehran, and everything that Farhad describes about Iranian politics and history, is factual.

Hamid Dehghani’s performance as Farhad is surely informed by his background as an award-winning actor and director in Iran. And likewise the script carries an authenticity that comes from intimacy with, and passion about Iran. Northlight’s production of ‘Andy Warhol in Tehran’ is a unique expression from those who know, and comes highly recommended. It runs through February 19, and hopefully even longer.

CityLit Theater’s ‘The Birthday Party’ opens with a load of laughs, seducing the audience with its low-key humor, then shaking us up as sinister overtones are gradually revealed.

We are introduced to the middle-aged operators of a British seaside boarding house: Meg (Elaine Carlson is delightfully comedic) and her dead-pan husband Petey (Linsey Falls in a flawless regional accent). Meg is all in a dither all the time—think 'All in the Famiily’s' Edith Bunker—just able to serve breakfasts of cornflakes and keep the larder filled.

WIth a naturalistic style that is reminiscent of David Mamet’s work (though written by Harold Printer decades before him) this play will leave you smitten by the characters, and the way repetitive, everyday speech is mined for its humor. And as with great comedy, it’s all in the timing, which the cast and director handle beautifully.

Meg and Petey's very down-on-its-heels establishment has had but one guest for the past year, Stanley (David Fink) and we soon see that the relationship with this lone customer has devolved to an enmeshed co-dependency between Meg and Stanley. She mothers, teases, and fauns over Stanley, who returns the excessive attention with a withering derision and acidic jokes that fly over the good natured Meg’s head.

Fink is perfect as the dissolute Stanley, a failed musician who sleeps in, and stays perpetually in pajamas and robe. Soon arrives the vivacious, self-assured Lulu (Sahara Glasener-Boles), a comely lass about Stanley’s age, who chides him for not bathing or going out of doors.

Things turn ominous when two new guests arrive in a big black limo—the erudite Goldberg (James Sparling is pitch perfect) and his towering thug McCann (Will Casey). Now Pinter takes the action to a darker level, as the titular birthday party for Stanley unfolds, despite his disinclination to attend. Fink ably registers Stanley’s discomfort with strangers entering the household, and Stan moves from suspicious to paranoid, desperately demanding (to no avail) that Goldberg and McCann find other accommodations. The play can be taken literally, but its many enigmatic and contradictory twists place it firmly in the absurdist camp. 

‘The Birthday Party’ was Harold Pinter’s first full length play, and it broke the mold, launching a genre: it is a ”comedy of menace” (as opposed to comedy of errors or of manners). Perhaps because it is so out-of-the-box, it closed after just eight performances following its 1957 premiere. But a positive review secured attention for Pinter, and ‘The Birthday Party’ is now recognized as a masterwork.

City Lit distinguishes itself in the selection of this play, and in an absolutely wonderful production. Highly recommended on the basis of casting alone, artistic director Terry McCabe deserves kudos. Don’t miss a chance to see this live production of a Printer classic, running at CityLit Theater through February 26, 2023.

Like Christina Anderson, the Tony award nominated playwright of “the ripple, the wave that carried me home” I too was naively unaware of the history of segregation of public pools.

Growing up in Brooklyn, NY, at the same time as the play’s timeline, public pools were more likely segregated by class than by race. Besides, beaches were the preferred pastime on a hot summer day in NYC. The play gave me a new perspective and made me think outside my sheltered world. It is highly recommended.

As water fills the space it finds itself in, this play has many themes and ideas filling the hour and forty-five-minute running time. Themes of patriarchy, access, racial justice, family dynamics, legacy and forgiveness are all marinating together. If it doesn’t come out in the wash, it will come out in the rinse.

The play opens in 1991 with unanswered phone calls to Janice, (Christiana Clark) a recruitment officer at an Ohio University. The calls are from a Young Chipper Ambitious Black Woman (Brianna Buckley) who is representing an African American Recognition Committee in Beacon, Kansas, her hometown. They are renaming a pool in honor of her father, who was instrumental in desegregating the public pools in Beacon. They would like her to attend and participate. She takes issue, her mother was just as involved in this fight as her father. Why is she not honored?

“ripple..” is a memory play and according to Janice, some of those memories are best left at the bottom of a deep pool. Janice narrates her time growing up starting in the early 60’s as the daughter of Edwin (Ronald Connor) and Helen (Aneisa Hicks). We learn Janice’s father is from the necessity class and her mother, the thinking class. These distinctions meant very little to the white majority, but these distinctions helped the audience understand how her parents approached life.

Between scenes of narration, we see this family in action. We see a teenage Edwin demonstrate how he covertly integrated a public pool and the resulting fallout. We see the sacrifices made by Helen, so her daughter and other children can learn the mechanics of swimming.

Todd Rosenthal’s set consist of the inside of a public pool building complete pool and trophy case. To change scenes the trophy case slides out and a household scene slides in. It is a nice and clean set change. While Janice doesn’t change costumes in the 30 years of the play, the other characters change from late 50’s to the 90’s. Montana Levi Blanco caught the essence of the time period with his costume choices. Cookie Jordan did an excellent job in hair and wig design. Until I read the program, I didn’t know Aunt Gayle and Young Ambitious Black Woman were played by the same actress (Brianna Buckley). It was clearly a testament to costume, hair, wig and performance.

Jackson Gay captured the feel and energy of family life in the 60’s and 70’s. The play moved smoothly from narration to action, from joy to tears and back again.

It is interesting Anderson chose to place her play in 1991 and work backwards. 1991 was the year of the “Rodney King Riots” when the officers that beat King within an inch of his life were acquitted. King survived the beating only to die in 2012 of …. you guessed it, drowning.

When: Through February 12th

Where: Goodman Owen Theatre, 170 N. Dearborn

Tickets: $15-$45

Info: www.goodmantheatre.org 

Have you ever fallen in love – or out of love? Have you ever lost the love of your life only to find the new love is waiting for you right around the corner at just the perfect moment? Have you ever found love when you weren’t even looking for it? In John Cariani’s play, Almost Maine, the audience follows a series of several vignettes that revolves around these questions, each taking place in a small out of the way Maine town that sits under the Northern Lights. Skillfully directed by Susan Gorman, the stories we are presented with are touching, charming and often very funny. While some scenes are more direct in their nature a few are intended for the audience to interpret – leaving myself in a healthy conversation on the way home on where we felt the writer was going. The nice thing about this play is that it relates to just about everyone who has been in a relationship in one way or another, so throughout the performance it was easy to say to myself on a few occasions, yep, I’ve been there…

To successfully pull off its nine heartfelt sketches, this talented cast of four take on the daunting task of playing five-plus roles each – and they absolutely nail it. Cast members, Eileen Dixon, Zach Kunde, Whitney Minarik and Rio Ragazzone each get to show off their wide ranges, particularly impressing with their spot-on comedic timing. The casting couldn’t have been more perfect as all four leave notable performances – and to be fair, I caught the final preview just before opening night.

The creative team does a fine job in staging this production. The set is simple – not much more than a few pine trees thoughtfully moved around a home or establishment entrance for each scene – but it works well thanks to an engaging script that really keeps our focus on each actor so that the set works more as a subtle background that leaves the actors with a wide open, nearly blank canvas, leaving the deeper details of its scenes up to the imagination of the audience.   

In all, I found Almost, Maine an irresistible collection of quaint love stories that touched on every end of the spectrum. Delightful and often laugh out loud funny, Oil Lamp Theater kicks off 2023 with a sure-fire winner that is sure to capture the hearts of so many. Almost, Maine runs through February 26^th. For tickets and/or more show information, click HERE.

Recommended!

*On a side note, it was my first time attending an Oil Lamp production in their Glenview home. Just a short (and easy) drive from Chicago, I found the theater space perfectly sized for an intimate, yet roomy, experience and there isn’t a bad seat in the house. I’d suggest arriving to a show early to check out the charming bar/lounge area that includes loads of comfy seating and the added nice touch of providing cookies for its guests. And with parking just next to the theater, it couldn’t have been a better all-around experience.

Fewer theatrical experiences are more thrilling than a Kander and Ebb musical done well. Porchlight’s revival of ‘Cabaret’ delivers the exact kind of razzle-dazzle audiences expect when they think of the Kit Kat Club. Directed by Artistic Director Michael Weber and choreographed by Brenda Didier, this production scrubs off some of the grit that’s become a hallmark of the iconic Rob Marshall Broadway revival. By using the same script, and borrowing some of the aesthetic, there’s a really satisfying buoyancy about Porchlight’s approach to this essential musical.

The success of any production of ‘Cabaret’ hinges on the actors playing the Emcee and Sally Bowles. This cast has two strong leads in the respective roles. Josh Walker channels neither Joel Grey nor Alan Cumming, but instead something more playful, adding a little mirth to the eerie Kit Kat Club host. Sally Bowles the character may only have minimal talent, but Erica Stephan has the soaring vocals songs like “Maybe this Time” and “Mein Herr” were made for. It’s a joy to watch her embody the part in every lithe movement and manic quip.

Part of what makes Kander and Ebb musicals like ‘Cabaret’ and ‘Chicago’ so infectious are the catchy songs and jazzy dance numbers. By now they’re almost inseparable from Fosse’s sexy choreography. The ensemble numbers in this production create thoroughly satisfying versions of some of the most beloved Broadway music of all time. Brenda Didier cuts through the dark currents of the script and gives audiences of both the Kit Kat Club and Porchlight exactly what they crave—beautifully distracting spectacle.

Based on the classic novella ‘The Berlin Stories’ by Christopher Isherwood, ‘Cabaret’ is an eternally relevant story about apathy during political crisis. The musical numbers are toe-tapping fun, but yet there’s something uneasy about ‘Cabaret.’ It’s a celebration of being “other”. Since the original 1966 Broadway production and the subsequent Liza Minnelli film, it’s become a landmark of queer culture. At its heart, it’s a play that reminds its audience not to take the right to be different for granted.

Despite the darkness on the fringes of ‘Cabaret’, Porchlight’s production injects some roaring 20s opulence into their version. Costumes by Bill Morey are styled in flapper-chic that seem more historically accurate and frankly, more attractive. The costumes move well with Didier’s Charleston-flavored choreography which also seems more authentic to the time period.

‘Cabaret’ gives the audience a sense that they’ve been whisked away somewhere exotic for two and a half hours. Every member of the cast is perfectly at home in their world and the come-hither physicality with which they beckon their audience is impossible to decline. Michael Weber reminds us again why Porchlight is a destination for contemporary musical theatre in Chicago. This production is every bit as good as the Broadway revivals that too often rely on stunt casting. Instead, Porchlight sheers away some of the overly morbid overtones and replaces them with a purer sense of escapism. After all, in here life is beautiful.

Through February 12 at Porchlight Music Theatre at the Ruth Page Center for the Arts. 1016 N Dearborn St. www.porchlightmusictheatre.org

*Extended through March 19th

If you love Rent, you’ll really like tick, tick…BOOM! If you don’t like Rent, you’ll probably still really like tick, tick…BOOM!, because what’s not to like about a great story and a talented cast? If you’ve ever struggled, strived, or attempted to create anything — or even just faced existential crises about getting older — tick, tick...BOOM! is relatable, funny, and heart-wrenching.

It's a musical about artists, for artists (and artist appreciators). It's a love letter to the process, the devasting lows and the ecstatic highs. It's sometimes even a love letter to Stephen Sondheim, who actually mentored the musical's late composer Jonathan Larson and saw great promise in him. (It's also an Oscar-nominated film directed by Lin-Manuel Miranda and starring Andrew Garfield on Netflix. Highly recommend.)

Most importantly, the music is fantastic.

And BoHo’s Theatre’s all trans and gender nonconforming production directed by BoHo Artistic Associate Bo Frazier would’ve made Jonathan Larson proud — it lets a diverse, talented-packed cast shine and captures both the humor and horror of the creative process in equal measure.

Larson’s most well-known and influential musical is 1996’s Rent, but he had another musical in the works when he tragically passed. Tick, tick…BOOM! is a semi-autobiographical, rock/pop musical about a young composer named Jon, who’s living the starving artist life in New York City in the early '90s and trying to get his show off the ground. (Can you smell the Rent? Thematic similarities abound: putting all your eggs in your own creative basket over everything else, roughing it in NYC, struggling with the idea of working to get by vs. working for creative fulfillment, staying true to your passions vs. the perceived soul-sucking of "selling out"... like Rent, there are even voicemails from concerned parents.)

I like to think of tick, tick...BOOM! as baby Rent, and an even more acute story, zeroed in on one man, one artist, his journey to make a difference and be heard, and the few people close to him that accompany him on the way.

BoHo Theatre's Alec Phan plays protagonist Jon as engaging and sweet — he's someone you'd want to be friends with, someone you'd root for. In fact, his friends in the show do. His girlfriend Susan, played with charm by Luke Halpern, and good friend Michael, played with nuance by Crystal Claros, encourage him to see his creative endeavors through, even as they take on boring, corporate jobs and move to the suburbs. It's like they've pinned their hopes on Jon too, like maybe they weren't able to make it, but they believe Jon can.

And, with the retrospect knowledge of Jonathan Larson's musical theatre success, we too wholeheartedly root for Jon and respect his integrity as an artist.

Each of the three cast members has extraordinary singing and acting talent, but the highlights for me were the songs that feature all three performers. The opening number "30/90" where Jon laments turning 30 in the year 1990 (and all that he'd hoped to have already accomplished by this point) and the closing song "Louder Than Words" build to choruses with three-part harmonies and uptempo rock piano — Billy Joel could never —that showcase this powerful blend of voices.

Some other fun ones to look up on Spotify: "Therapy", "Sugar", and "Green Green Dress".

Besides the catchy music, the main thing that drew me to Rent as a teenager was its representative cast. It's not just about one type of person, but a bouquet of different types of people, of different races, different sexualities — the first Broadway musical where the LGBT characters outnumbered the heteronormative characters. While the original iteration of tick, tick...BOOM! featured cisgendered characters and actors, this genderfluid production combines the spirit of both of Larson's creations, giving equal voice to a spectrum of humans and normalizing the marginalized.

One thing’s for certain: Jonathan Larson would’ve loved this production.

Tick, tick…BOOM! is playing at The Edge Theatre at 5451 North Broadway from January 19 through February 5, 2023. Tickets and information here.

As a child of the 80s, I fondly remember sitting up on weeknights and watching tv sitcoms with my folks. Many of them—Murphy Brown, Designing Women, etc.—proved a bit too mature for my (still) juvenile sensibility. But one “old people” show I always loved (and still do) was The Golden Girls. The timeless and ageless foursome of mature ladies—Blanche, Dorothy, Rose, and Sophia—was just as entertaining to little me as Steve Urkl or Alf or Pee-Wee Herman. So I was excited to see what Mercury Theater—just about my favorite Chicago theater of late—would do with these figures from my childhood with their production of The Golden Gals.

The show—written and directed by Ginger Minj—totally harkens those golden icons of 80s television with its rapid-fire one-liners and nonstop off-color humor. Minj also stars as Blanche Devereaux, channeling Rue McClanahan’s sassy Southern sexpot while prancing and pouting through the Miami condominium set designed by Bob Silton.

While Minj provides the sauce and the script, her three roommates resemble their television counterparts even more closely. There were points where I’d close my eyes and hear Divine Grace’s Dorothy and think I was listening to Bea Arthur—Grace’s impersonation was that dead-on. Gidget Galore’s Rose is also eerily close to Betty White’s simple Scandinavian from St. Olaf, MN. And as a child, my favorite of the four was always Sophia, played here by Mr Ms Adrien, who is still my favorite. Jason Richards—last seen at the Mercury in Priscilla—is the ensemble, playing a whole host of characters coming and going from the apartment, and keeps up with the gals throughout.

The show itself is as much fun as a sitcom episode, and more, with Burt Reynolds mustaches, ribald jokes, a fringy Tina Turner dress (and dance routine to match), an 80s aerobics routine that’d make Richard Simmons proud. So, if you long for those beloved TV ladies and their wisecracking antics, check them out in The Golden Gals at Mercury Theater, from now until February 12^th.

Irving Berlin’s White Christmas at the North Shore Center for the Performing Arts in Skokie 

is an absolutely fantastic seasonal Christmas show that pulls out all the stops!

I am a huge fan of the original film White Christmas and this talented cast, which was well-directed by Sasha Gerritson, brings so much of the magic of Irving Berlin's amazing music and the fun romantic storyline to colorful life from beginning to end. 

Tommy Thurston (Bob Wallace) and Jimmy Hogan (Phil Davis) play two World War II veterans with a successful song-and-dance act who meet and fall in love with two performing singers, Kelly Britt (Betty Haynes) and Anna Marie Abbate (Judy Haynes) who are sisters traveling by train to perform at what they are hoping will be a snow filled, vacationer packed holiday crowd at a quaint but flailing Vermont Inn owned by the two men's previous commanding officer. When the snow doesn’t arrive, they have to think fast if they want to draw that big holiday crowd.

All four leads are great singers and dancers! Wallace as Tommy Thurston really hits his stride with a deep note of romance with "How Deep Is the Ocean" in a call and answer number withKelly Britt (Betty Haynes) belting out “Love, You Didn’t Do Right by Me”.Britt is a delight and wows the audience in several numbers including the comical "Falling Out of Love Can be Fun". 

Alicia Berneche (Martha Watson, the inn’s concierge), is a mature actress who blows the audience out of the water when she transforms from what we think is an amateur wanting to join in on the show to a powerhouse singer and comedienne with her jaw-dropping and heart soaring performance of “Let Me Sing and I’m Happy”.

The stage is a holiday feast for the eyes. The costumes and large moving set are colorful, festive, and exciting. The huge Christmas trees are all lit magically and draw you into their warmth and glow. 

ALL of the dancers/ensembleare fantastic and positively wow the audience with a variety of dance forms including a spectacular tap dance to “Blue Skies”.

I LOVE a huge cast and seeing this many dancers onstage at once is a holiday treat for the eyes and ears that every single member of your family will be dazzled by. 

I highly recommend seeing this Joyful Christmas extravaganza in cozy comfort with all your family and friends. This great production show will make you appreciate the season as we ourselves are snowed in by our own freezing cold White Christmas! 

"Bald Sisters," in its world premiere at Steppenwolf Theatre, tells of a Cambodian refugee who escaped the unspeakable terror of the Kmer Rouge with her daughter, and made a new life and birthed a second daughter in the U.S. But the play only touches that in passing, instead focusing on universal themes as it portrays very realistically the generational divides that affect us all.

With incredible performances across the board, Bald Sisters is must-see theater. But the biggest star just may be the script by Vichet Chum, a rising playwright gaining national renown. Bald Sisters was created under a new play development initiative by Steppenwolf Theater Company, which reliably discovers and delivers work by promising playwrights with fully realized productions, this one directed admirably by Jesca Prudencio.

Chum’s characters, who represent familiar Boomer, GenX, Millennial types, are fully dimensional, their speech realistic, fresh, and completely on key for the range of ages and personalities. He gives the actors convincing language to work with, and they deliver it powerfully.

We have the mother, Ma (Wai Ching Ho), a naughty sprite who has put all the bad memories behind her, living in the moment, and readily speaking her mind. Ma prefaces her most pointed remarks with, “I probably shouldn’t say this, but I’m going to,” eliciting laughs, while cueing the audience for the zinger to follow.

Ma generally directs the barbs at her eldest daughter, Him (Jennifer Lim), whom we deduce escaped with her from Cambodia. Him and Sophea (Francesa Fernandez McKenzie), Ma’s younger daughter, are planning mom’s funeral - a plot device that brings a clash between the daughters. Him has a darker view of the world, while her younger sibling Sophea - born in the U.S. - has traveled an easier path. Sophea was spared the trauma of Him’s past as a refugee, but she longs to be anchored in her culture, seeking her roots by meditation and styling herself as an eastern zen. Him, on the other hand, has assimilated into U.S. culture, marrying a white Christian minister.

The end-of-life hook is a convenient device for the siblings to confront unfinished business. The younger sister Sophea is living an extended adolescence, and is very judgmental about her older sister Him’s life and values. Him sees her sibling as an infantile bag of pretension and Buddhist wanna-be.Him, though seriously ill, lives a dutiful life, supporting Ma in her decline, and her husband Nate in his church career.

Jennifer Lim gives a most noteworthy performance, on opening night delivering one of those incredible Steppenwolf-style monologues, filled with fury and passion, so affecting that the audience burst into applause. Francesa Fernandez McKenzie, as Sophea, conveyed in her physical performance as much or more about this pouty, self-immersed girl-woman as the playwright’s fresh, dead-on millennial lines.

Also notable were Coburn Goss as Him’s husband Nate, and particularly Nima Rakhshanifar as Seth, a college student who mows lawns, and whose Middle Eastern and Muslim heritage showed the author is at home writing any type of character. Seth sings a Muslim song of mourning that transcending language, was viscerally moving. A shout out to Andrew Boyce for scenic design, and to Polly Hubbard, dramaturg, a role that serves as eyes and ears so theater companies stay abreast of trending talent and scripts like this one.

Highly recommended, Bald Sisters runs through January 15, 2023 in Steppenwolf’s new 400-set in-the-round Ensemble Theater.

‘Too Hot to Handel’ captures all the majesty of Handel’s baroque music masterpiece, but adds soul, infusing it with the power of equally classic jazz, gospel and blues interpretations. This annual tradition - it ran December 3-4 this year - was launched in 1992, and was first performed at Chicago’s Auditorium Theatre two decades ago, where it returns for two performances each year. It never fails to surprise and delight—so much so this reviewer has seen it six times.

By reinterpreting portions of the classic work with treatments that include varieties of jazz, along with gospel, backbeats, and scat, “Too Hot to Handel” amplifies and highlights Handel's 1741 score. Purists may be tempted to scoff at any meddling with the original, but there are actually many variations in the canon, such as tempo, instrumentation (modern and original instruments), etc.

It is no accident that numerous jazz masters from Keith Jarett to Herbie Hancock move with fluidity between jazz and baroque musical forms. “Too Hot to Handel” shows why. It allows both performers and the audience to respond emotionally to Handel’s inspirational original through the free forms of modern music, relinquishing the intensive restraint imposed by baroque.

Perhaps chief among the numerous powerful performances is that of Rodrick Dickson, an opera star of international renown. His clarion tenor all alone equals in force and magnitude the combined power of the chamber orchestra, jazz combo, and symphonic choirs against which he performs. Dickson’s delivery of “Comfort Ye,” “For He is Like a Refiners Fire” and other sections, carries everything Handel had to have intended for it, and then amps it up with the departures from the work.

Likewise opera soprano Alfreda Burke, whose role hews tighter to Handel’s score, carrying it with clarity and power against the driving backdrop of a swinging orchestra and chorus. An accomplished principal in major productions of Puccini, Poulenc, Beethoven and many others around the world, Burke’s voluptuous voice delights in “There Were Shepherds Abiding in the Field.”

Then there is Karen-Marie Richardson, mezzo-soprano, bringing unabashedly jazz delivery to “Oh Thou that Tellest Good Tidings to Zion” and other sections with a style that contrasts distinctly from Burke and Dickson, and yet is equally as affecting.

There is much more to say about “Too Hot to Handel,” most importantly the tour de force performance by Detroit pianist Alvin Waddles, who at one point must improvise through 18 bars; the sheet music is simply blank, and he runs with it. And each year it seems another star performance emerges, which without question was principal saxophonist Greg Ward, whose stand-up solos were emotionally intense reveries on whatever had preceded them.

Created in 1992 as a collaboration between conductor Marin Alsop with orchestrators and arrangers Bob Christianson and Gary Anderson, “Too Hot to Handel: The Jazz-Gospel Messiah” had its Chicago premiere at the Auditorium Theatre in 2006. The production has returned every year since, formerly during the weekend before Martin Luther King Jr. Day. This year, Too Hot to Handel landed right in the middle of the traditional Messiah season in the weeks leading up to Christmas.

Using the original musical material from Messiah, Alsop, Christianson, and Anderson reinvented the basic melodic and harmonic outlines of Handel’s original by using scat, backbeats, jazz and gospel vocals, and instrumental improvisation. If you missed it this year, mark your calendar for December 2023 when “Too Hot to Handel” returns to the Auditorium Theatre.