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Michael Gebert Chef DiGregorio with Chicken Mario Chef David DiGregorio has been in Chicago for 35 years, but he still has the broad East Coast accent of his native Rhode Island—an accent that bespeaks big family tables full of hearty Italian food. After working for several restaurants here, he’s spent the last ten years as chef-partner of Lettuce Entertain You’s Osteria Via Stato, which celebrates its tenth anniversary on Wednesday with a party benefiting the United Cerebral Palsy Foundation....

If he ever gets tired of the entertainment business, Chance the Rapper should consider a career as a fortune teller. At the moment, it looks like Emanuel’s planning to stick one in the industrial area on both sides of the Chicago River near North Avenue—one of the fastest-growing corners in town. It’s called the Cortland/Chicago River TIF District, and it would be located in the area between Webster on the north, North Avenue on the south, Clybourn on the east, and Elston Avenue on the west....

Since 2004 Plastic Crimewave (aka Steve Krakow) has used the Secret History of Chicago Music to shine a light on worthy artists with Chicago ties who’ve been forgotten, underrated, or never noticed in the first place. As a 16-year-old ninth grader in Brookfield, Haydock started his band the Boppers, modelled after Vincent’s backup group, the Blue Caps. Eventually known as Ron Haydock & the Boppers, they became one of Chicago’s first proper rock ‘n’ roll groups, back when the sound was still rooted in rockabilly (Elvis Presley, Bill Haley, et cetera)....

Wolfram Lotz’s fractured take on Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (and its famous cinematic version, Apocalypse Now) started out as a radio script, inspired by the 2010 trial of Somali pirates in Hamburg. In Sideshow Theatre Company’s hallucinatory staging of Lotz’s script (translated by Daniel Brunet and adapted by director Ian Damont Martin), we’re thrust into a disjointed world that moves between “Oaktown” (aka Oakland, California), where a young pirate (Meagan Dilworth) faces trial and offers a meandering explanation to the court, and a dark river journey straight out of Conrad....

An advertisement allegedly produced by Aeromexico recently went viral offering a discount proportional to the percentage of Mexican heritage its American customers could demonstrate. In the video, tequila-loving, burrito-eating ‘Murrikans aren’t sure if they are winning or getting a booby prize for the (spoiler!) Mexican blood found flowing through their pale, pale veins. This is only funny because the same xenophobia that conceived of the one-drop rule hasn’t been bred or bled out yet....

Sue Kwong This winter, the Reader has set a humble goal for itself: to determine the Greatest Chicago Book Ever Written. We chose 16 books that reflected the wide range of books that have come out of Chicago and the wide range of people who live here and assembled them into an NCAA-style bracket. Then we recruited a crack team of writers, editors, booksellers, and scholars as well as a few Reader staffers to judge each bout....

When the movie is made of Donald Trump’s crusade for president, cinephiles will have the feeling they’ve seen this show before. And look at their leaders in Congress. Is Mitch McConnell an interesting person? Is Paul Ryan? Does either quicken your pulse? And what about the statehouses? Does Scott Walker push your buttons? How about Kansas’s zany Sam Brownback or our own Bruce Rauner, exuding testosterone as if it were the last quarter-inch of caked toothpaste?...

The Native, the new bar in the long-dormant space formerly occupied by the late-night dive Bonny’s, has an unexpected draw: a friendly, bouncy puppy named Dolly whose pure delight in everything she encounters is infectious. On a recent evening at the bar, she was particularly taken with watching people play a shuffleboard-style bowling game in the back, occasionally batting at the puck as it sailed by. Her owners, Jared and Carly Savocchi, also own the Native, which they opened late last month as a low-key neighborhood bar....

Even though William Shakespeare never set foot in Chicago, the writer’s influence has long been palpable in the city, and the Newberry Library has the collection to prove it. In conjunction with the citywide celebration of Shakespeare’s 400th birthday, Shakespeare 400 Chicago, “Creating Shakespeare,” a new exhibit, features nearly 200 Bard-related objects, including a playbill from 1862 that credits John Wilkes Booth as the lead in Othello at Chicago’s McVicker’s Theater, a personal ad signed “Hamlet and Iago” from an 1877 newspaper, and a collection of facial hair from Chicago Shakespeare Theater’s costume department....

Canceled events, publishing delays, shuttered bookstores—in many ways, 2020 was an awful year for Chicago writers. But it was a fantastic year for Chicago readers, at least when it comes to new fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. To keep this list manageable, I’ve limited it to books with a strong emphasis on the city itself. That means you won’t see books set elsewhere, like Natasha Trethewey’s Memorial Drive and Kathleen Rooney’s Cher Ami and Major Whittlesey, nor books with broader subject matter, like Mikki Kendall’s Hood Feminism....

Jeremy Pelt has firmly established himself as one of the finest mainstream trumpeters in jazz, zigzagging among varied projects but retaining a strong identity. His latest recording, High Art (HighNote), is billed to the Power Quintet, a skilled combo that works within the tradition, summoning the spirit of classic 50s hard bop but adding a measured contemporary sheen. Joined by pianist and longtime colleague Danny Grissett, liquid-toned vibist Steve Nelson, redoubtable bassist Peter Washington, and casually versatile drummer Bill Stewart, Pelt complements the music’s brisk swing with his melodic fluidity and pure, plush tone....

It’s 8 AM on a Friday in Boystown and 26-year-old Danielle Larsen unlocks the door of the CBD Kratom shop. She has long black hair and wears black Converse sneakers, high-waisted jeans, and a green short-sleeved polo with the shop’s logo stitched on the front. The corner storefront is drenched with sunlight, filled with the not-too-loud pulsation of a Muse song, and ready to receive its first customer. The shop is airy, with a wood-laminate floor and high ceiling....

Emile Griffith is the sort of historical anomaly who should naturally inspire great dramas. Born poor on the Island of Saint Thomas in 1938, he was sexually abused by a male relative and abandoned by his mother when she became a sex worker—a development that so horrified him he pleaded for admittance to the local reformatory. At 15 he found his way to New York City and took a job in a hat factory, a natural fit as he’d been designing elaborate millinery for years....

The Owl The Owl is more than just another 4 AM bar filled with already-drunks pining to extend the night further into the wee hours. While the Logan Square hideaway has several features that pair well with fun mistakes—dim lighting, mirrored walls, a decadent waterfall flowing behind the long, curved bar—it also books obscure acts in its claustrophobia-­inducing back room, courtesy of talent buyer Aaron Dexter. Notable out-of-towners who’ve played the Owl include harsh-noise artist Pharmakon, experimental guitarist Tashi Dorji, blown-out scuzz rockers Obnox, and electronic-psych legends Silver Apples; Chicago-­based powerhouses such as Disappears and Pelican have crammed their equipment into the space too....

Pretty soon you’re going to have to confront cheese tea. Seems like a reasonable pairing that might work in more than a few neighborhoods around town and certain suburbs. But last month when they opened their second location on Argyle Street, they had something else in mind: Malaysian food. Still, these dishes are almost afterthoughts to Bingo’s tea menu, which spans fruit teas (dragon, yuzu lemon honey, black grape), milk teas (buckwheat matcha, caramel black), and more subdued honey drinks....

It’s another year. Which promises to be not that much different from the shit show that was last year. But the publishing industry continues to churn, which is good news for those of us whose favorite form of escapism is books. Here’s a list of the upcoming titles that have gotten us most excited—including but not limited to a guide to Swedish death cleaning and a thriller about a missing president cowritten by Bill Clinton....

Toni Preckwinkle is the front-runner in the race for mayor of Chicago, sort of. According to a Sun-Times poll conducted by We Ask America, Preckwinkle and Daley are “nominal” front-runners with Preckwinkle at 12.7 percent and Daley at 12.1. The We Ask America poll also found that in hypothetical runoffs, Preckwinkle would lose—though not by much—to both Mendoza and Daley. Bowen—who worked as deputy campaign manager for Rahm Emanuel in 2011, has managed City Council and Senate campaigns, and worked on Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign—said that running for mayor of Chicago is more like a presidential campaign, with TV and radio stations and major newspapers putting a microscope to candidates....

In mid-January, YouTube star Ingrid Nilsen broached the subject of tampons with President Obama. The ordinance, introduced by aldermen Ed Burke and Leslie Hairston, would exempt feminine hygiene products from taxes in Chicago, reclassifying them as “medical appliances.” The aldermen also proposed lowering the tax to 1 percent throughout Illinois, the tax rate currently imposed on drugs, food, and medical appliances. But some critics contend that the widespread ire against the “tampon tax” is misplaced....

Chicago Dance Month returns for a ninth time this June with in-person events featuring Chicago dancers and dance companies outdoors at Navy Pier and McKinley Park. Previously held in April, this year’s celebration launches a whole summer of Saturdays featuring dance at Navy Pier produced by See Chicago Dance. There will also be an online presentation June 24 as part of Chicago Takes 10, a virtual tour of the performing arts in Chicago sponsored by the Walder Foundation....

Much of the new energy injected into Chicago’s bustling free-jazz and improvised-music scenes over the past year or two has come from a small group of players associated with Amalgam Music, a modest local label run by drummer Bill Harris. His efforts have introduced me to the music of pianist Matt Piet and saxophonist Gerrit Hatcher, among others, and members of the circle to which they belong have made themselves ubiquitous at local spots such as Elastic, Slate Arts, and Constellation....