Displaying items by tag: Alex Weisman

We often forget that The Taming of the Shrew is, at its core, a play within a play - a bit of theatrical mischief in which characters watch other characters pretend. Marti Lyons’s ambitious new adaptation for Court Theatre not only remembers this but revels in it. She reframes Shakespeare’s battle-of-wills as a private, immersive experience for five elite guests - figures who could easily have wandered off the set of Succession—invited to indulge in a curated world of erotica, fantasy, and power play. This is not like any production of Shrew I have ever seen. And I love it.

Lyons taps into the erotic charge embedded in Shakespeare’s text. For Lyons the struggle between Kate and Petruchio isn’t a patriarchal lesson but a provocation - an invitation to consider what people consent to in the privacy of their desires, even when those desires run counter to their public personas. In fantasy, we try on identities we might never inhabit in daylight. Could Kate, in this telling, actually be exercising her agency by consenting to a submissive role in her intimate life while fiercely maintaining her autonomy in her public life? The question lingers.

The production openly engages with bondage, discipline, dominance, submission and S&M,  - not as taboo spectacle but as a consensual system built on trust, communication, and negotiated power. This is especially evident at Petruchio’s house.  Instead of treating Kate’s submission as Shakespeare’s dreaded moral, Lyons reframes it as a conversation about desire and embodiment. The cast leans into this with a refreshing clarity: pleasure, not punishment, drives the story. Power is a game, and everyone in the room is choosing to play.

By foregrounding the play-within-the-play structure, Lyons opens a fertile space not only to re-engage with the text but to ask ourselves uncomfortable, thrilling questions about love and control, submission and domination, agency and desire. It is rare for a Shrew to feel so sensual and so intellectually alive.

Much of the production’s force comes from its ensemble. As Katherina, Melisa Soledad Pereyra embodies fire, humor, and hunger—a woman who knows her own body and mind. Her chemistry with Jay Whittaker’s Petruchio is the engine of the evening: two equals circling, sparring, testing limits until the battle between them becomes a dance. Netta Walker’s Bianca is no docile ingénue; she claims her place with confident wit. Samuel Taylor, Nate Santana, and Dexter Zollicoffer bring sharp comedic flavor to Hortensio, Lucentio, and Gremio, while Ryder Dean McDaniel anchors Tranio with duplicitous cunning. The supporting cast - Alex Weisman, Monica West, and others - soften and sharpen the edges of the world as needed.

The design team conjures a world where erotic imagination thrives. Jackie Fox’s scenic design refashions Court Theatre into a sensuous playground of marble black-and-white tiled floors, sculpted statues, expansive botanical murals, and imposing wooden doors. Kotryna Hilko’s costumes heighten the atmosphere with daring textures - leather for Petruchio, jewel-toned gowns for the women, jacquard damask for the aristocrats - each piece balancing revelation and restraint, structure and seduction. Every visual element underscores Lyons’s central argument: desire is a kind of performance, and every performance is a negotiation of power.

This Taming of the Shrew pulses not with brute domination but with the sensual, exacting choreography of consent. Lyons doesn’t blunt the play’s jagged edges; she sharpens them into tools of erotic inquiry. Her staging invites us to feel the heat of what is given freely, the tautness of what is deliberately withheld, and the exhilaration of boundaries tested - then mutually defined.

Court Theatre’s production doesn’t simply reinterpret Shrew; it challenges us to reinterpret ourselves. By grounding the story in erotic power exchange and consciously negotiated dynamics, Lyons’s adaptation pushes us to confront the desires we rarely articulate. What do we relinquish willingly? What pleasure do we find in surrender? And what power do we claim by choosing when—and to whom—we yield? In Lyons’s hands, the theatre becomes a chamber of self-interrogation, where the line between performance and private longing thins, and we’re invited to examine the fantasies that shape us as intimately as any script.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

When: through Dec 14TH

Where: Court Theatre, 5535 S. Ellis Ave.

Running Time: 2 hours, 30 minutes 15 minute intermission

Tickets: $60 - $90.00 Student, Group and military discounts available

773-753-4472

www.courttheatre.org

"The Temperamentals" by Jon Marans makes its Chicago premiere at About Face Theatre. Artistic director Andrew Volkoff revisits this 2009 Off-Broadway play in a critical time for LGBT rights in America. This play was selected for their season long before the election, but serves to remind that the struggle for equality is not over. 

"The Temperamentals" refers to a slang term for homosexuals in the 1950s. It tells the true story of the Mattachine Society, the first LGBT rights group in America. Kyle Hatley plays Harry Hay, a closeted college professor working on behalf of gay rights. The Mattachine Society is formed when he meets Rudi Gernreich (Lane Anthony Flores). Gernreich is an up-and-coming designer who escaped the Nazis in Austria. His observations about life under the Third Reich inspires Harry Hay to action. 

Maran's script shines in the way it intertwines the historic plotline with authentic relationship dramas between characters. Alex Weisman plays Bob, the promiscuous one, with such sincerity even while cycling through several bit parts. Lane Anthony Flores gives a brave and dynamic peformance as chic European designer Gernreich. Also featuring Rob Lindley and Paul Fagan, About Face has assembled an all-star cast for this vital piece. 

Many think that gay activism started at Stonewall, but what "The Temperamentals" documents is the West Coast movement that began in the 1950s. The Mattachine Society was pitched to influential closested homosexuals in Hollywood, like Vincent Minnelli, but failed to garner mainstream interest for fear of blacklisting. Its intention was to decriminalize homosexuality. 

Jon Maran's play is sexy and stylish. It echos of Larry Kramer and that's what theater needs right now. It's a nearly three hour wake up call to a generation who takes advantage of the privileges fought for by activism. 

Through February 18 at About Face Theatre. Theatre Wit 1229 W Belmont Ave. 

Boys love their rockets. We find this out rather quickly in Marriott Theatre’s world premiere of October Sky, a new musical based on the 1999 film featuring Jake Gyllenhaal and Chris Cooper. Written by Aaron Thielen with the music and lyric by Michael Mahler, the play opens with a heavy duty musical number “Marching into Hell” where a handful of coal miners head deep into the dangerous coal mines.

Taking place in 1957 Coalwood, West Virginia, most boys are destined to become coal miners. Opportunity to take another career path are far and few between. The city depends on the mine, which has become even more dangerous with newer technology that powders the coal, leaving a hazardous dust to be inhaled and cause lung disease rather than the older days where the mineral was gather by using picks. Occasional gas explosions also take place as we find out in the first scene as news of such a tragedy leaves thirty dead in a nearby mine.

Homer’s father, John Hickam, heads a large mining crew and fully expects his son to follow suit. However, when the Soviet Union launches Sputnik for all the town to see in the October Sky, Homer and his friends are driven to make a rocket of their own. Naturally, Homer’s father sees this as a distraction, while the town supports the boys as their rockets slowly become more and more advanced, despite their moments of failure. With the help of Miss Riley, Homer’s teacher who recognizes their interest in such a science as a way to avoid the destined mining life, the boys eventually take their work to a series of science fairs. While Homer’s mother is supportive and pleased with Homer’s ingenuity, his father still struggles with the idea. 

October Sky is not just a story about boys making rockets, it is also a story about support from friends, changing hearts and perseverance. It is a feel good story that encourages one to follow their dreams.

Superbly cast, I really enjoyed Nate Lewellyn in the role of Homer Hickham. He is a bit reminiscent of a young and boyish Tom Hanks. Lewellyn displays his solid vocal range in many challenging numbers, perhaps most notably in Act II’s “Stars Shine Down”. Ben Barker, Patrick Rooney and Alex Weisman perfectly round out the quartet of rocket builders while Susan Moniz really shines as Homer’s wise and loving mother, Elsie Hickam. One of my favorite performances is that of David Hess as John Hickam. I really find it a pleasure to observe Hess’ vocal prowess and his ability to execute such a wide variety of emotions. 

The songs are lyrically clever – and often funny, while the set has a few fun surprises such as the effect used as the miners take an elevator down into the mine. Theresa Ham does a fantastic job as costume designer, really pulling off the 1950s era and Dance Captain Jameson Cooper utilizes some very unique and original ideas in the big dance numbers. The show is finally brought together tightly with a strong ensemble and a wonderful band that knows how to get their southern twang on when needed. 

One of the show’s big crowd pleasers was the knee-slappin’ number “Moonshine”, a lively number that takes place in the backwoods and has the actors playing instruments as “Bathtub Amos & The Drunk as a Skink Jug Band”.  

October Sky runs around two-and-a-half hours long but is quite enjoyable throughout thanks to a fetching story, fun effects and enjoyable musical numbers. October Sky is being performed at The Marriott Theatre through October 11th. You can find out more about the show or order tickets at www.MarriottTheatre.com. 

It's not often you see the words erotic and Dachau in the same sentence. Bent by Martin Sherman is one of the few literary works to address homosexuality and the Nazis. Under the direction of Keira Fromm, The Other Theatre Company presents this Pulitzer Prize nominated play as part of their freshman season.

Bent calls to mind many of the same themes and issues raised by Christopher Isherwood in his novel The Berlin Stories, later to inspire the musical Cabaret. What makes these stories so fascinating is the alternative narrative to the well-known story of Hitler's persecution of Jews. What many don't know is that the Nazi regime persecuted gays, gypsies, the handicapped or anyone who was different. Also, that non-Jewish Germans simply went along with the darkening tide, terrified or unaware of its ultimate goal: ethnic cleansing.

Sherman set out to write a play that mirrored his own time, a closeted late 1970s on the cusp of the AIDS epidemic. While there are some glaring historical inaccuracies in this play - he makes his point. Philandering Max (Nik Kourtis) lives both and in and out of the closet as it suits him, until he finds himself imprisoned at Dachau for "perversion." While en route, he befriends fellow "queer" Horst (Alex Weisman) who helps him stay alive. Over the course of their internment at Dachau the two become lovers in uniquely staged sexual encounters.

While the play is quite faithful to its source material, the direction could have been stronger. Weisman is quite sure of himself and turns in a top notch performance as tragic Horst. Kourtis on the other hand stumbles through the emotional peaks and valleys of his anti-heroic character. By now, there are countless literary interpretations of the Holocaust and what this particular production misses is the bewilderment victims of concentration camps must have felt. These characters never seem to step back and address the atrocity and disbelief of the exaggerated instances of cruelty in the script. They're prematurely numb to the horrors of camp life and in the end, the inherent sense fear doesn't translate to the audience in the way many other Holocaust dramas have succeeded. The underlying themes get a little mixed up and you're never sure exactly what The Other Theatre Company would like you to take away.

Through July 26th at The Other Theatre Company. 3829 North Broadway. (773)528-9696