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Big media companies have long since figured out that they can extend the profitability of their film assets by turning them into stage shows. Disney alone has recycled properties from Beauty and the Beast to Aladdin. We’ve seen theatricalizations of Kinky Boots and Shrek, School of Rock and Once. Hairspray and The Producers both started out as movies, transmuted into musicals, and then morphed back into movies. A scored version of Groundhog Day will premiere at London’s Old Vic this year....

Every election cycle I find myself confronted by the memes that say, “If you don’t vote, then you can’t complain,” or my personal favorite, “Our ancestors died for the right to vote.” These are frequently written by black people aimed at other black people, “reminders” by way of guilt trips. There’s usually a lot of disgust that comes with reading those statistics. But I get it. I mean, think about all the wrongheaded rhetoric and political tactics black people are subjected to every election cycle....

Public interest and enthusiasm for abolishing Illinois’s prohibition on rent control is growing. In Bronzeville last Thursday night, a crowd of around 200 people packed a church auditorium to hear presentations organized by the Lift the Ban Coalition. The group of 20 community groups has formed in recent months to push for a repeal of the state’s 1997 Rent Control Preemption Act and subsequently lobby for a rent regulation ordinance in Chicago....

Like a lot of privileged people I know, I’ve been able to make sweatpants a new staple in my work wardrobe. My general appearance, whether it be polished or not, has very little to do with my job anymore, save for the occasional shave and haircut for the benefit of my coworkers. My clothes are mostly for comfort. And when I want to dress anything but the most casual, it’s for myself....

British rapper Simbi Ajikawo, who records as Little Simz, jumps right into your ears with her distinctive beats and fluid style on “Might Bang, Might Not,” the first song on the new Drop 6. “You ain’t seen no one like me since / Lauryn Hill in the 90s, bitch,” she raps, laying down the law to anyone who might question her abilities or commitment. “I am a one-woman army / I am the force that we speak of....

Andy Kang is the executive director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Chicago, a nonprofit committed to building power through collective advocacy and organizing to achieve racial equity. In the 1980s, the American auto industry was severely struggling and many politicians and business leaders aggressively blamed Japan, publicly saying things like “little yellow men” were “taking over the country” and engaging in nothing less than an “economic Pearl Harbor.” This sort of rhetoric resulted in the brutal murder of Vincent Chin, a Chinese American who was celebrating his upcoming wedding in Detroit before he was chased down and bludgeoned by two white men who claimed that Americans were losing their jobs because of people like him....

For the past few years that we’ve put out our Best of Chicago issue, we’ve asked our readers to submit photos via Instagram that express what’s best about Chicago—and every year we receive photos that beautifully capture the spirit of the city. Our critics’ picks and the results from our readers’ poll may be debatable, but one thing’s for sure: the best things about Chicago are the people who call it home....

Welcome to the Reader‘s morning briefing for Friday, November 24, 2017. John Lausch starts working immediately after being sworn in as U.S. attorney John Lausch was sworn in as the U.S. attorney in Chicago Wednesday, less than two weeks after being confirmed by the U.S. Senate, according to the Tribune. Lausch, who was nominated by President Donald Trump in August, started working immediately after the swearing-in ceremony. Despite being a Trump pick, Lausch is well liked by Democrats and Republicans, including Senators Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth....

There are quite a few films by Italian director Marco Bellocchio I haven’t seen; much of his older work remains unavailable for home viewing in the U.S., and several of his more recent titles never screened in Chicago. But I can aver based on the ones I have seen that Bellocchio’s output runs the gamut from great to terrible. His caustic, politically astute satires Fists in the Pocket (1965) and China Is Near (1967) are some of my favorite Italian films of the 1960s, and his Good Morning, Night (2003) and Vincere (2009) are some of the best Italian films of the current century....

When I interviewed Chicago rapper and SlumpGang member Receo Gibson a few years ago about changing his stage name from Sage, the 64th Wonder to Lunxch, he said he did it to help get out of a creative tight spot. “When I was under the moniker Sage, I felt, like, clustered,” he said. “I didn’t know what to do musically. I didn’t have no direction. It drove me into a panic, a mental panic....

More than a hundred people filled the Quarry Event Center in South Shore on Saturday, October 12, to share and hear testimonials about the effects of Chicago’s growing rent burden on low-income families and seniors. In a town-hall-style forum the Lift the Ban Coalition sought to mobilize interest and support for a continuing legislative push to lift Illinois’s decades-long ban on rent control and perhaps even establish rent control laws across the state....

As a deep admirer of Matt Nelson’s playing in projects including the saxophone quartet Battle Trance and Amirtha Kidambi’s experimental outfit Elder Ones, I was super excited to hear what the saxophonist could do within the bruising context of Grid, a trio with electric-bass stomper Tim Dahl (a regular collaborator of former Chicagoan Weasel Walter) and drummer Nick Podgurski (Extra Life). When I first put on the trio’s self-titled album for NNA Tapes, I had trouble locating Nelson’s presence—it sounded like sludge music with coruscating guitar feedback and no discernible woodwinds....

I went to a play a few days ago. In the Before Times, that would have been like saying “I took a shower.” (I’m still showering regularly. Don’t get it twisted.) Prior to the shutdown last March, like most theater writers, I spent at least three to four nights a week at shows. Then it went down to “zero.” (Have you heard about this thing called “bingeing a TV series?” It’s wild!...

You made it past Bastille Day, so it’s time to bust out for some fun and social stimulation. Whether you’re hankering for roots rock, hungry to explore the history of hip-hop, or ready to sit back and laugh with other people at live theater and comedy again, here are some things to explore this week. Fri 7/16, 7 PM: Jason Ringenberg made his name in the early 80s with the cowpunk band Jason and the Scorchers, and has kept the torch of alt-country going ever since....

Last week I wrote about the recently issued First Recordings by the Schlippenbach Trio, the peerless free-improvising trio that features drummer Paul Lovens and Evan Parker and is nominally led by pianist Alexander von Schlippenbach. Although he was one of the key figures in the development of a bona fide European jazz aesthetic, that doesn’t cancel out Schlippenbach’s fluency in the American tradition. Back in 2002 he launched his brilliant Monk’s Casino project—joined by the four members of the superb Die Enttäuschung, he performed and recorded every extant tune composed by Thelonious Monk....

Italy’s il Tricolore flies proudly above River North’s Te’ Jay’s Adult Books—oops, sorry, it appears over Il Porcellino, the “Everyday Trattoria” next door. The flag is positioned just so as to blot out the porn shop’s sign as you gaze up at the restaurant’s own marquee. Named for the Florentine bronze boar that tourists feed their spare lire for good fortune, Il Porcellino is the restaurant Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises has spawned, apparently by groupthink, to fill the space after retiring Paris Club (and Brasserie Jo before that)....

Eric Garner wasn’t much of a criminal kingpin—an affable cigarette hustler who peddled tax-free cartons of smokes and “loosies” from his chosen corner on Bay Street in Staten Island, New York. He liked it that way (“Felony money for misdemeanor time,” he called his chosen hustle). That low profile might have led the 43-year-old man’s killing at the hands of the NYPD on July 17, 2014, to have gone unnoticed by many outside of Tompkinsville Park....

Q: My wife and I have been married for 14 years and in a committed (I assumed) relationship for 17 years. Sex between us (often kinky) has always been great. We have a wonderful life together and two perfect children. I thought we were good; turns out things were too good to be true. I learned recently that my wife has been unfaithful to me throughout our marriage. She began an affair with an older man soon before we were married, and they were physically intimate for five years, including bondage and a master/sub relationship....

Reader editorial employees (myself included) voted 19-0 today to unionize as the Reader unit of the Chicago Newspaper Guild. The new unit will now elect officers and select a bargaining team to negotiate a contract with Wrapports LLC, owner of the Reader and the Sun-Times. Over the years, the idea of joining a union was raised occasionally at the 43-year-old Reader without gaining any traction. Serious discussions among the staff began after the paper was purchased by Wrapports in 2012 and moved from the building it once owned at 11 E....

Ah, the roller rink—a community center where everyone keeps moving in circles, forever, to retro pop songs, in colored slacks and bowl cuts. There is no time there. There is no world beyond its borders. There’s only the supremely charming Lucky Plush ensemble, sliding their bare and socked feet over the Marley flooring in Steppenwolf’s black-box theater. Rink Life, devised by director Julia Rhoads in collaboration with the ensemble, brings life to this insular society, where everyone mostly gets along most of the time....