Windy City Playhouse Takes Immersive Theater to the Next Level with The Recommendation

You’d think the meaty new production, The Recommendation, currently playing at Windy City Playhouse was tailor made for immersive theater.  With a few accommodating revisions from playwright Johnathan Caren, director Jonathan Wilson and his creative team fused a suspenseful story of trust and friendship on a kinetic “living” stage; making the combined effect more powerful than you’d likely expect.

Windy City was the first theater to successfully introduce the immersive theater concept to Chicago audiences early last year with their monster hit Southern Gothic. Then the set was a full scale multi-room house and the story examined the personal intrigues of friends living in a small southern town.  An audience of about 30 people occupied the same physical space as the actors in each room of the house.  You could find yourself standing next to an actor as he or she delivered dialogue or watch from across the room as one actor confronted another in the heat of dramatic conflict.   The story was compelling but it was the set that was the star.  It’s also the main reason the show is still running at the theater’s South Loop extension these many months later.

The Recommendation ups the game on all fronts.  What initially looks like will evolve into a casual buddy play between guys from vastly different backgrounds turns into something much more interesting and intense.  Thanks to some top flight acting, killer sets, and a story that builds heat like a pressure cooker; the performance is one that intrigues as well as satisfies.

Opening the first scene in the theater’s lobby proved wonderfully clever and provided an unorthodox way to meet two the story’s main characters; a boy of ambition and one of privilege.  It also gave the audience a taste of how the regular rules of theater weren’t going to be applicable here.

To enhance the sense of involvement and play up the audience’s physical proximity to the cast, food and drink are often offered during the performance.  And because the action doesn’t take place in a single contained space, guides are always on hand to usher you from set to set as the action and story develop.

The first stop, a college dorm at Brown where the boy of ambition, Iskinder (Issy) Iodouku, and the boy of privilege, Aaron Feldman (Julian Hester) meet as roommates during their freshman year.  One the son of an Ethiopian immigrant and the other is a Callie kid whose prosperous father houses his family in Brentwood. The match is not well balanced.

They’re both open, smart and ready to win.  Throughout the play, the differences in their backgrounds and prospects are repeatedly emphasized.  One takes his access, options and position for granted as the matter of fact consequences of some natural order.  The other observes the machinations of privilege in quiet awe, mildly resentful and hesitantly envious of the comfort Feldman’s life provides and the doors it opens.  Because of their acceptance of one another, their friendship seems to grow into something genuine and it doesn’t surprise when Feldman offers to have his father send a letter recommendation to a prestigious law school on Issy’s (Michael Aaron Pogue) behalf. 

Following them as they become young men, still close and settling into their lives; it’s Issy who seems more poised to reach his golden ring than his friend; whose place among the elite begins to appear more tenuous.  He still moves in the world of the entitled; but more as a supporting player; not the lead.

A chance traffic stop rips away all of Feldman’s protective shields.  Not knowing why he’s been detained and fearing that a heinous secret has caught up with him, it’s in a holding cell that the story flips into a gripping mind game.  The emotional tension ratchets up to inferno levels when Feldman finds himself in alone in the cell with Dwight (Brian Keys).  It’s hard for him to figure out if this crudely eloquent slightly delusional ersatz confidante is on a hustle or genuinely trying to help him. Fear had already compelled him to divulge his damning secret.  Tatted and muscled, Dwight’s a jail savvy recidivist who’d make a formidable protector.  They make a pact.  Dwight will help Feldman survive county and; once he’s free, Feldman will use his connections to secure Dwight’s release.  Feldman’s reneging on that promise reveals the play’s heart, discloses how friends will try to right the wrongs of people they care about and reminds us that good intentions can backfire in profound ways. 

Moving from the wholesomeness of a college dorm to the forlorn suspense of a holding cell, from a bewitchingly intimate café where Feldman tries to rationalize his betrayal to the sauna of a high-end health club; we witness the moral stakes keep rising for all three men.  It’s in the sauna that each of them is forced to own who they are and what they’re made of through physical confrontation and self-examination.  Some of what we learn deserves admiration.  Other things dismay.  Throughout, the craft Keys, Hester and Pogue display convinces us of the sincerity of their characters to pursue their individual sense of right and responsibility.

A year in the making, with the objective of insuring easy audience flow from scene to scene as well as provide dramatic visual interest, Lauren Nigri’s sets were often stunning in the way they defined atmosphere and retained compositional richness.

The Recommendation shows how this experimental, not quite interactive take on staging continues to evolve.  As the line between audience and cast becomes more and more faint, can more empathetic theater happen?  As time and methods advance, it’ll be interesting to find out.

The Recommendation

Through September 22^nd, 2019

Windy City Playhouse (Flagship)

3014 W. Irving Park Rd.

Chicago, IL    60618

773-891-8985