George Balanchine’s “The Prodigal Son,” created in 1929 for the Ballets Russes, with music by Sergei Prokofiev and scenery and costumes by Georges Rouault, enters the repertory of the Joffrey Ballet for the first time when the company opens its spring season at 7:30 p.m. Thursday in the Auditorium Theatre.
Over the years, Balanchine’s intensely dramatic retelling of the biblical story has become one of the staples of 20th Century ballet, performed since 1950 by the master’s own New York City Ballet and its demanding, highly athletic and emotional title role danced by such stars as Edward Villella and Mikhail Baryshnikov.
At the Joffrey, as part of a program featuring works that originated with the old Ballets Russes, Calvin Kitten and Davis Robertson will alternate in the role. In addition to opening night, “The Prodigal Son” is on the bill at 7:30 p.m. Friday, 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 2 p.m. March 19.
The Joffrey Ballet of Chicago performs March 16-28 at the Auditorium Theatre, 50 E. Congress Pkwy.; 312-902-1500.
— Richard Christiansen
TELEVISION
“Raising the Mammoth”: The Discovery Channel heads to frozen Siberia for this entrancing special about the excavation of the remains of a 20,000-year-old mammoth; 7 p.m. Sunday.
“Screen Actors Guild Awards”: Just ahead of the Oscars, the actors’ union gives out statues in five film and eight TV categories; 7 p.m. Sunday, TNT.
“Freaks and Geeks”: The excellent but endangered first-year NBC series, about high-school life in 1980, returns to the air after a brief hiatus; 7 p.m. Monday, WMAQ-Ch. 5.
— Steve Johnson
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Takehisa Kosugi: Japanese composer, musician and installation artist joins Jim O’Rourke for composed and improvised music; 7 p.m. Sunday at the Museum of Contemporary Art; 312-397-4010.
Stewart Goodyear: Gifted young pianist in his local recital debut; 8 p.m. Tuesday in Mandel Hall, University of Chicago; 773-708-8068.
Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra: World premiere of Roland Vasquez’s commissioned “Dreams and Shadows Passing: Ghost in the Mountain,” Carmon DeLeone conducting; 8 p.m. Saturday, Center for the Performing Arts, Governors State University, University Park; 708-481-7774.
— John von Rhein
JAZZ
Marian McPartland: The venerable pianist pays homage to Duke Ellington in a collaboration with the Chicago Sinfonietta; 7:30 p.m. Monday in Symphony Center, 220 S. Michigan Ave.; 312-857-1062.
Ahmad Jamal: A restlessly innovative pianist and bandleader, Jamal has influenced several generations of musicians; Tuesday through Sunday at Jazz Showcase, 59 W. Grand Ave.; 312-670-2473.
New Black Music Repertory Ensemble: The genre-defying group will explore “The Black Composer and the Negro Spiritual”; 7:30 p.m. Thursday at South Shore Cultural Center, 7059 S. South Shore Dr.; 312-747-2536.
— Howard Reich
THEATER
“The Infidel”: A provocative and exceptionally inventive drama about a venerable judge whose well-ordered life is overturned by an obsession he cannot and does not want to deny. Mike Nussbaum is brilliant as the bedeviled jurist in a vivid, imaginative production, beautifully realized by director Anna D. Shapiro; through March 26 at Steppenwolf Studio Theatre, 1650 N. Halsted St.; 312-335-1650.
“The Lower Depths”: The plucky Shattered Globe Theatre tackles, with surprising and gratifying success, Maxim Gorky’s naturalistic masterwork dealing with the downtrodden and dispossessed in czarist Russia; through April 2 in Victory Gardens Studio Theatre, 2257 N. Lincoln Ave.; 773-871-3000.
“Nixon’s Nixon”: A surrealistic fantasia on what might have happened in a meeting between President Nixon and Henry Kissinger the night before Nixon resigned, played with great relish by Larry Yando and William Brown; through April 2 at Writers’ Theatre Chicago, 664 Vernon Ave., Glencoe; 847-835-5398.
— Richard Christiansen
ROCK
Aimee Mann and Michael Penn: Mann is riding high on the strength of her acclaimed “Magnolia” soundtrack; Tuesday at Park West.
Korn: Feel their pain; Thursday/Friday at Allstate Arena.
Terry Callier: Folk-soul giant; Saturday at Old Town School of Folk Music.
— Greg Kot
ART
“Monet to Moore: The Millennium Gift of Sara Lee Corporation”: Opens Monday; Art Institute of Chicago, 111 S. Michigan Ave.; 312-443-3600.
“Drawing on the Figure: Recent Works on Paper from the Manilow Collection,”: Opens Saturday; Museum of Contemporary Art, 220 E. Chicago Ave.; 312-280-2660.
— Alan G. Artner
