“Every single play I direct brings up the question—why do we do plays?” says Anne Bogart, the founder of New York’s SITI theater company. “Radio Macbeth,” the company’s work now showing at Court Theatre, is no exception. Set in the 1940s, the play follows an ensemble of actors rehearsing for a radio performance of “Macbeth” in an empty theater. With multiple layers of performance going on throughout the play, the question arises as to what exactly the audience is watching: a performance of “Macbeth,” a performance of a company performing “Macbeth,” or a performance of the inner workings of the SITI ensemble on top of these other layers. Is it about Shakespeare’s famous work, or the experience of being an actor? Read the rest of this entry »

The musical “Caroline, or Change,” now playing at Court Theatre, takes place in November and December of 1963. It opens on the day of John F. Kennedy’s assassination, though for most of the first act the characters go about their everyday tasks without any awareness that the president has been killed. “There is no underground in Lousiana, only underwater,” sings Caroline (E. Faye Butler), doing laundry for an upper-middle-class Jewish family in the basement of their home. The idea that rising water is both a harbinger of change and a violent force that could destroy the status quo pervades her every day, as she toils in the only basement for miles. The end of 1963 was a scary and uncertain time in America, with the escalation of the Civil Rights movement and the Vietnam War. Caroline’s stressful life and her shaky ability to support her family on only $30 a week mean that she must shut out the events of the outside world. For her, subsistence is a greater concern than social progress. Read the rest of this entry »

“Bat Boy: The Musical” is a play based on a recurring feature in the Weekly World News tabloid about a boy who grows up in a cave isolated from mankind with bat-like features—sharp, pointy ears and fangs—until he is discovered in his hideout. The plot of “Bat Boy” is very much like that of French author Michel Tournier’s 1967 novel, “Friday or The Other Island,” a spin on the original “Robinson Crusoe,” where Crusoe finds an uncivilized human being who can’t communicate (he can neither talk nor read), gives him a name, Friday, and chooses to “raise him” as a man. Read the rest of this entry »

The actor looked nothing like O. J. Simpson.

“Orenthal,” a production involving the Renaissance Society, the Experimental Station, and Court Theatre, had begun. The description of “Orenthal” in the email sent by the Renaissance Society was promising: it was to be a one-act portrayal of O. J. Simpson’s rise and fall, which would be contrasted with the story of Shakespeare’s Othello. I wondered what the two really had to do with each other. True, Othello and O. J. were both black, with white wives. And their names both began with O. But the story of Othello is a bit more fleshed out than that of Orenthal James Simpson—Shakespeare accounts for the reason behind Othello’s crime. The murder of Nicole Simpson, O. J.’s wife, was never resolved. What would be the base of “Orenthal,” the play? Read the rest of this entry »

Family, religion and race coalesce in Court Theatre’s production of Leslie Lee’s classic play “The First Breeze of Summer.” After having acted in a production at the University of Michigan in 1977, and two years later directed a production in Flint, Michigan, director Ron OJ Parson revisits and revives “First Breeze” at Court Theatre, where he is currently a resident artist. This production arrives almost thirty years after its original premiere in New York by the Negro Ensemble Company. Read the rest of this entry »

A pale beam of light washes over an elevated throne, lending it a sickly glow that cuts through the darkness. We will see many swords, but appropriately, this glistening prize is the only object remaining onstage throughout the grotesque affair. It is both the catalyst for the ensuing butchery and its silent witness. Slowly the players emerge, and fall into stylized stances around the throne, as a menacing, hunchbacked Richard addresses the audience in his famous monologue: “Now is the winter of our discontent…” Read the rest of this entry »

In eighteenth-century Leipzig, a new temptation beckoned from the street corners—coffee. This new luxury inspired Johann Sebastian Bach to write a miniature comic opera known as the “Coffee Cantata.” Last year, a group of University of Chicago students founded the Cantata Collegium, and Thursday evening’s performance of the satirical “Coffee Cantata” at the Smart Museum of Art was their debut. The group was able to secure an Arts Council grant to adapt the piece for a modern audience. This involved a complete translation of the libretto from German to English, modified instrumentation, and original costume and set designs. Read the rest of this entry »

Shaquocora Henderson has big plans for her future. “I’m going to be the CEO of my own company,” the eighth grader says. “I’m not going to work for anybody.” When asked about future colleges, she says without hesitation, “It’s still a battle between Harvard and Brown University.” Read the rest of this entry »