Wandering Through Chicago's Arts and Culture

The Employer's Dilemma Increasingly we read articles that examine the low US unemployment rate along with the difficulty in finding qualified employees to fill those positions. I recently came across an article that explores some of the reasons that according to author Josh Bersin contribute to the problem and perhaps more importantly, what can be done about them. Here's the full article:  The Ugly Side To Today's Low Unemployment Rate . My Reaction I read this article at least twice, took notes, tried to gain some sort of overview of what was being said, and came away feeling that while the article was "okay," it was hardly something I would call great or even above average. What Bersin Said to Me I actually found two key observations in Bersin's article, but I'm not certain he intended his writing to convey the importance I attach to them. Expectations and Reality After itemizing a bunch of statistics that highlight a disappointing state ...

Raven Theater,  6157 N Clark St, Chicago, IL 60660 Now thru May 27, 2018 Raven Theater Website Friday evening (April 27, 2018) I had a remarkable experience attending a performance of The Gentleman Caller, a world premier production of a Philip Dawkins play. The play attempts to imagine what might have happened when Tennessee Williams met William Inge in Inge’s St. Louis garden apartment and later in a Chicago hotel room in 1944 and 1945. We don’t know exactly what took place, except that Williams encouraged Inge to pursue play-writing. Dawkins’ script attempts to recreate those moments based on what we know of the two men’s lives. The fact that the program has a credit for David Wooley as Fight & Intimacy Choreographer should alert you to some of the play’s content. (The extent of the fighting was a single face slap as I recall, if that helps you imagine more clearly.) Both Williams and Inge were homosexual, although radically different in their self-acceptance and ultim...

33 Variations by Moises Kaufman directed by Nick Bowling Timeline Theatre Company at Stage 773, 1223 W Belmont, Chicago 8/24/2012–10/21/2012 As I watched the play this evening I was struck by the fact that the ending to Act I is a fugue for actors. (I failed to pay attention to what the piano was doing during this finale so it may have well been Beethoven’s fugue along with the actors’ fugue.) Musing about things during intermission I focused on the notion that musical composition is generally a motif followed by instances of repetition, sequence and variation based on that idea. The Diabelli waltz actually yielded three (or possibly four, I am depending on external analysis here, not my ears) motifs from which Beethoven constructed the finished set. On the way home I mused over what the underlying motif of the Kaufman play might be. I walk about a mile and a quarter to get home from Stage 773 or Theater Wit so I had a good deal of time to muse. Upon arriving home I thumbed through t...

David Douglass and Ellen Hargis Show Dazzling Versatility I have only discovered the Newberry Consort recently, meaning that although I knew of the name I never knew exactly what they did or nor had I experienced any of their performances. Now, after exposure to three of their remarkable presentations I am beginning to gain an appreciation of just what these artists are capable of giving us and the enjoyable journeys the lead through the span of several hundred years of early music. Miracles, anyone? First I attended Rosa das Rosas, a work in honor of the Virgin Mary commissioned by Alfonso X, a twelfth-century king of Castille, León and Galicia. The performance was accompanied by interesting visuals prepared to compliment the early music. The venue, St. Michael in Old Town, with its white and gold icons and imagery, was a stunning accompaniment to music that was, in essence, a token of gratitude for divine intervention. Ellen Hargis This was largely a vocal p...

Spring Awakening One Hundred Years of the Same Old Same Old The Musical What I saw this past weekend at Griffin Theatre Company’s production of the Steven Sater and Duncan Sheik Broadway show was in every sense of the word a modern rock musical, replete with over-amplified, ear-splitting and word-obfuscating sounds masquerading as musical expression. In fact, most sources describe Spring Awakening as an alternative rock musical. Unfortunately, there is no particular agreement on what alternative rock is except loud with lots of twanging guitars and an outgrowth of punk rock. Despite all of this, Spring Awakening is a provocative and moving experience. The musical follows the plotline of the original Frank Wedekind play rather faithfully and this is probably the great strength of the Broadway version; they started with a compelling story and dropped some songs and dancing into the works to arrive at a more or less winning musical. Time and Place As is my custom when I know n...

Charles Dickens Begrudgingly Performs A Christmas Carol. Again. I have seen lots of theater this holiday season that ranges from the absurd that is barely a cut above the amateur to the honed professionalism of actors well-versed in their art and craft. There were two that stand out in my memory as “best of season” and both are one-man presentations. Earlier, I reviewed The Sanaland Diaries at Wandering Through Chicago's Arts and Culture: Murder on the North Pole Express . Yesterday, as a capstone to my Christmas theater travels, I watched the last performance of Blake Montgomery’s realization of what it must have been like for Charles Dickens to repeatedly present his annual reading of what is perhaps the best-loved of all Christmas novels, A Christmas Carol. I am familiar with Montgomery’s style of theater development; it is an organic method that starts with a story and then attempts to tell that story on the stage. In the process a lot of discovery takes place, a lot o...

Murder on the North Pole Express The Santaland Diaries Explores the Dark Side of Customer Service David Sedaris first aired his essay The Santaland Diaries on NPR’s Morning Edition on December 23 rd , 1992. It has become a staple of the Christmas Season ever since. After twenty years it probably qualifies as “tired,” “trite,” “venerable,” or “shopworn.” But let’s face it: pieces like The Santaland Diaries, Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, the film Holiday Inn (think of the Irving Berlin song White Christmas ,) Dylan Thomas’s A Child’s Christmas in Wales and Truman Capote’s A Christmas Memory all satisfy an urgent and powerful need of the human spirit; we need to be connected during the holiday season regardless of whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukah, Kwanza, the Pagan Solstice or the simple pleasures of the Atheist who treasures time spent with family and loved ones. Actor Mitchell Fain skillfully becomes Crumpet, the Elf, who works at a variety of positions at Macy’s Santaland...