Let me make an unsolicited suggestion to triple the Lookingglass Theatre box office. Instead of calling the current show “Untitled Vampire Play,” which is bloodless to the point of vegetarianism, make it “Hey, Mom and Dad, My Fiancée is a Vampire!”
Ka-ching on the Magnificent Mile.
That’s actually a fair summary of the first scene of Kevin Douglas’s new show, a lively and amusing summer romp ideal for thirsty fans of the genre, and you don’t have to pay Broadway prices for “The Lost Boys,” either.
Herein, a young Chicagoan, Dom (Jordan Arredondo) brings home his adorable new girlfriend, Val (Courtney Rikki Green) to visit his wise-cracking dad, Louie (Kareem Bandealy) and his Chicago cop mom, Alicia (Cynthia Kaye McWilliams). After she waits politely to be invited in (LOL), the loving parents jump through hoops trying to be warm and supportive of this woman who claims to be thousands of years old, and to have changed the course of history with a well-placed bite or two. It’s a very funny scene, not least because Douglas focuses on the normative characters and, as with all good vampire stories, the conversation functions as a metaphor for the loss of control every parent feels when their progeny brings home a wacky potential partner.
Better yet, it’s all peppered with enough Chicago references to fill an episode of “The Bear,” or at least one where the chefs specialized in vital fluids beyond au jus. Val, I should note, is trying to be a better vampire by feeding from blood bags rather than naked necks, but, you know, it’s always a struggle.
I wish that scene had been longer, frankly, or that those loving parents made more frequent and longer returns, but “Untitled Vampire Play” then gets into the backstory of Val, who has an acolyte, Rose (Jin Park), whose regular coffined slumbers have not stopped her from being something of a gaming icon, one who very much wants to be freed by Val. This pair has nonetheless managed to function as more-or-less normal Chicagoans (at least of the City Hall variety) until their brother, Roderick (Walter Briggs), arrives from a prior century. Not only is Roderick pursued by a voracious vampire hunter, played as a low-rent Javert by the ever-flexible Bandealy, but he’s more your standard issue vampire-disrupter: big voice, bigger attitude, Bram Stoker-like verbosity. He has a preferred method of food supply and I ain’t talking the Green City Market.
Mom the cop thus finds herself in a Viagra Triangle version of Scandinavian noir.
I’ll leave it there. Lookingglass Theatre is not in Mary Zimmerman territory here — this is really more procedural-slash-sitcom territory, actually, but there is nothing wrong with that on Michigan Avenue in the summertime, especially given a very lively and droll production from director Devon De Mayo on a clever set from Alyssa Mohn.
Any vampire show, of course, both has to set its own rules and pay homage to the rules of the genre. Not that they are consistent beyond the blood-sucking part. In this case, I liked the writing best when little had yet been explained and we could concentrate on the notion of vampires in everyday Chicago, but that can only go so long, I guess, and Douglas delivers on what I imagine many vampire fans most want to see.
The show does not go on too long, either. It gets out by the scruff of its neck (I’ll be here all week).
Douglas’s wit is aided by a cast that takes everything very seriously, as it should. Indeed, Green throws off a kind of 1970s Wonder Woman vibe at times, especially given how she is costumed by Theresa Ham, and that adds to the fun. Park’s plaintive gamer-vampire is witty, too.
All in all, the show bops along quite tastily. Avoid the front rows if you are averse to being splattered by “blood.”
One final note: Lookingglass really has to get some better signage, and pronto. Thousands of people are walking by every day, blissfully unaware of the entertainment inside the old Water Tower Pumping Station, no longer restricting itself to water.
Chris Jones is a Tribune critic
cjones5@chicagotribune.com
Review: “Untitled Vampire Play” (3 stars)
When: Through July 12
Where: Lookingglass Theatre Company in Water Tower Water Works, 163 E Pearson St.
Running time: 2 hours, 10 minutes
Tickets: $33-$103 at 312-337-0665 and lookingglasstheatre.org
