Contrary to what you might expect, Memorial Day heralds an early-summer renaissance in the Chicago theater. Many troupes schedule new work in June — a month that’s also a busy time this year for touring Broadway attractions. And with the notion in mind that nothing complements the warm breezes better than a whimsical tune or two, musicals tend to bust out all over Chicago every spring.
The usual revivals are on the slate (including “Me and My Girl” at Drury Lane Oakbrook Terrace), but there’s also an unusually large complement of new musicals on offer in the next few weeks.
The Shubert Theatre hosts the touring production of George C. Wolfe’s “Bring in ‘Da Noise, Bring in ‘Da Funk” for a two-week Chicago stop, beginning on June 16. When it opened in Detroit last fall, the touring show proved to be a strong replica of the Broadway original. Hitting the road without its principal creator and performative force, this touring “Noise/Funk” covers the big hole left by Savion Glover’s personality with superlative hoofin’ and drummin’ by a very young, hip cast. Watch out in particular for the dance incarnation of a horrific racial murder in the number “The Lynching Blues,” superbly performed here by a skilled 16-year-old named Dominique Kelley.
The Goodman Theatre, meanwhile, is trying to breathe new creative life into a 1997 Broadway flop known as “Play On,” opening June 29. Some of the cast members (such as star Andre De Shields) are the same as they were when this show (briefly) played the Brooks Atkinson Theater, and the Duke Ellington musical is still directed by Sheldon Epps. But there will be changes in Cheryl L. West’s book for the Goodman, adjustments to the score and a very different design for a show that’s another contemporary retelling of William Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night.” “Play On” moves to the Seattle Repertory Theatre after its Chicago sojourn.
On a much smaller scale, two talented but still largely unknown young composer-lyricists, Robert Hartmann and Scott Keys (the authors of the entertaining “Macabaret”), will be premiering a new musical called “The Vanishing Point” on June 19. Based on the lives of three famous women who disappeared — Amelia Earhart, Agatha Christie and evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson (the last two eventually would reappear) — the show will be presented by the Porchlight Theatre in one of the intimate spaces at the Athenaeum Theatre.
If you are more interested in traditional fare, the Evanston-based Light Opera Works is trotting out a revival of the Gilbert and Sullivan classic “The Yeomen of the Guard,” opening May 30. Seen less frequently than many of the other operettas by this Victorian English duo, “Yeomen” is the most serious of all the Gilbert and Sullivan musicals. Instead of the typical trivial and satirical shenanigans, this piece actually plumbs some emotional depths — and there’s no happy ending.
For those who prefer to be outdoors, the redoubtable Jackie Taylor’s “Great Women in Gospel” (previously seen at the Black Ensemble Theatre) will be playing Navy Pier’s Skyline Stage on June 11 and 12. There’s talk that the Black Ensemble (the most commercially minded African-American theater in the city) will become a permanent part of the summer programming on Navy Pier.
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The critically well-received revival of John Guare’s “Six Degrees of Separation” (in which an interloper poses as the son of actor Sydney Poitier) has become one of the biggest box-office hits at the Raven Theatre in the history of this ambitious storefront house. According to Raven’s artistic director, Michael Menendian, the 70-seat theater has been turning away more people than it has been able to accommodate on the last few Saturday nights. Most other shows have also sold out — proof that there is still a large Chicago audience for a well-produced and urbane contemporary play with a known title.
“This play deals with so many issues,” says Menendian. “We’ve been attracting a much wider cross-section of people than usual. And the familiarity of the movie version has really helped sales.”
Unlike some other less prudent non-Equity theaters, Raven is careful to limit its mainstage productions to the very small number that can be well produced within this impressive theater’s limited resources. The lack of a subscription season also gives Raven the option to greatly extend any hit show. Thus, “Six Degrees” will now be playing for an additional eight weeks. The fall project is not yet set, but Menendian says that he is learning towards a revival of Arthur Miller’s “A View From the Bridge.”
Menendian says he turned down an offer to transfer the show to the much larger Ivanhoe Theatre (a move that would have been a financial gamble).
“Why risk dollars you don’t have to risk?” Menendian observed recently. “Besides, there’s an artistic intimacy to this show that you would lose in a 500-seat theater.”
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After a bidding war with several other theater companies, the Bailiwick Repertory Theatre’s David Zak says that his company has won the rights to Mark Ravenhill’s hit London play, “Shopping and F******.” Given the ink generated by this controversial and nihilistic play in New York (a largely unprintable title does not hurt), this fall production should generate some much-needed dollars and creative attention for one of Chicago’s most prolific (but perennially resource-strapped) theater companies.
