For many, the world Qualia envisions was first glimpsed in Cormac McCarthy’s seminal novel, The Road, a haunting tale of a man and his son desperately trying to survive in the midst of devastation after a nuclear Armageddon. In the 2006 masterpiece, hope has been abandoned, wretchedness is constant and much of what’s left of …
Subtext’s New Play Exposes and Celebrates the Malleability of Love Read More »
The acquisition of fame and notoriety may indeed be gifts from the stars; a matter of destiny where personal exceptionalism inevitably leads to broad recognition. In the world premiere of Stokely: The Unfinished Revolution, we get a strong sense of how it manifests over time. Time also has a tendency of turning the past gray, …
Court Theatre Powerfully Recalls a Hero and His Movement Read More »
The monumental strike that brought Hollywood to a standstill for much of the latter part of last year stayed front of mind during The Singularity Play now running at Jackalope Theatre in Berger Park. In that strike, the Writers Guild of America (WGA) and the Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio …
The Singularity Play Peers into a Dystopic Techno Driven Future Read More »
Frustration and anger can fuel beautiful art that sheds essential insight on the world and the people who inhabit it. Sanaz Toossi’s, English, now on the Goodman’s Owen stage, does that and much more as it takes us inside an Iranian classroom where three adults and an eighteen-year-old are struggling to learn English as their …
On the Question of Immigration, English Lets Courage and Sacrifice Lead Read More »
Psychological trauma in family’s holds a macabre fascination. By definition painful and lingering, it attracts and retains our interest because we never know its depth or where it will lead. Will the structure and direction of the lives in question lead to catharsis or tragedy? Or will the outcome rest somewhere in between; a hazy …
Sisters Struggling to be Sisters Dominate Into The Earth with You at BTE Read More »
Swedish choreographer Alexander Ekman seems hardwired never to limit his imagination. His drive to test the elasticity of dance’s boundaries may have been awakened in his mid-teens while dancing professionally with the Royal Swedish Ballet. By his early twenties, he was creating his own dances and freelancing as a professional choreographer. Although the types of …
Joffrey’s Midsummer Night’s Dream Turns Matchless Dance into Phenomenal Theater Read More »
Few musicals can claim as convoluted a backstory as Guys and Dolls. It’s songs were created before its story. Its plot grew out of a chance suggestion. And the person who ended up scripting its storyline had never written for Broadway before. Despite that, the acclaim the musical received in 1950 when it debuted on …
Wonder, surprise, incredulity, excitement, joy. Maybe a rush of adrenaline. They’re all the things you’d hope to find in a magician worth his or her salt. And in Look Closer with Joshua Jay at Rhapsody Theater, they’re not only all present, each shine like newly minted gold. But in this magic show, you’re also enthralled …
Look Closer at Rhapsody Gives New Luster to Magic’s Glow Read More »
Unless you’re English, just the term “choir of man” may sound a little perplexing. More than likely, your mind will race to spiritual or religious connotations rather than beer. But in the land of monarchs and cricket, there’s a tradition of men coming together to sing in choirs at their local pubs. That history became …
What does it mean to be extraordinary? After meeting Bill Wilson, a New York stockbroker in the late 1920s, neither he nor the life he leads rings as remarkable. That’s also true for Dr. Bob Smith, a career surgeon in Akron, Ohio during the same period. They’re both men pushing through life with a particularly …
Bill W. and Dr. Bob Chronicles the Birth of a Pivotal Movement Read More »