Heritage Auctions/Wikimedia Commons At least Lincoln was enjoying some humorous theater. Some things we read and remember, others we read and forget, and once in a while something comes along it feels almost improper to know. A good example is the name of the play Abraham Lincoln was watching at Ford’s Theatre the night of April 14, 1865, when he was assassinated. It was something called Our American Cousin. So what?...
There’s a bit of a nod-nod, wink-wink irony in the title of Kenneth Branagh’s latest exploration of the genius of William Shakespeare. All Is True refers to the alternate title of Henry VIII, the Bard’s penultimate play, which was being staged in 1613 at London’s Globe Theatre when the playhouse caught fire and burned down mid-performance. That fire is a documented fact, one of the relatively few available about the historic figure who may be the most celebrated poet and playwright of all time, but yet left precious little evidence from which later generations could reconstruct his personal history....
Since the 90s, Chicago-based musician Kevin Drumm has released countless experimental soundscapes that include oddball prepared guitar, minimal ambience, and earth-shaking drones; the first time I saw him perform was when he opened for Sunn O))) and Boris at Logan Square Auditorium in 2006, and his brief synth set tested the PA’s low end just as much as either of the famously loud headlining bands. But while Drumm constantly puts out new recordings, his live performances are few and far between—in fact, tonight will be his first local show since 2017....
Onetime Chicagoan Angel Olsen showed signs of vast talent years ago, but the artistic growth, charisma, and self-possession she projected during her powerful set at this year’s Pitchfork Music Festival proved she’s the real deal. It’s illuminating to consider her development in the context of November’s Phases (Jagjaguwar), a collection of rarities and previously unreleased material from 2012 to 2016. Its songs may not appear on her official albums, but most artists would kill to produce anything as good as her outtakes....
“I’ve always considered myself a movie guy and a collector,” says Brian Chankin, owner and operator of Odd Obsession, in what may be the understatement of the year. Not only was Chankin able to open the out-there video rental store in Bucktown with his own DVD and VHS collection a dozen years ago, but this summer, with help from his sister Heidi Anne Chankin, he started up Deadly Prey Gallery (1433 W....
Partial It’s always sad when somebody robs a tour vehicle, and it’s happened to acts as big as Sonic Youth and Leon Russell—to avoid simply throwing in the towel and going home, the musicians are forced to play borrowed equipment or buy an entire new stage rig, while sending increasingly desperate pleas to fans asking them to comb pawnshops for the missing gear. But it’s barely possible to steal equipment from Partial, the Pilsen-based duo of Noé Cuellar (also of Coppice) and Joseph Clayton Mills (from Maar and Haptic)—and even if you did, it wouldn’t slow them down at all....
In early March, Shin Thompson’s Furious Spoon ramen minichain was humming, with five locations in the city and Evanston, and a new one set to open in Indianapolis. But contraction also presented him the opportunity to flex. As a kid, Thompson spent lots of time in Japan visiting family—he spent his first two years there. He grew up on the country’s unique form of curry and rice, or kare raisu, thick and enveloping, mild, sweet, and warmly spiced, with fat chunks of meat, carrot, and potatoes, often topped with a thick, crispy, panko-breaded, deep-fried pork or chicken cutlet....
David Axelrod swears he’s not trying to spin anyone—even as the veteran political operative makes the familiar argument that Chicago needs a tough-guy mayor, that his old pal Rahm Emanuel is that guy, and that the city could face grave consequences if voters don’t understand that. As a media strategist, Axelrod has been crafting political narratives for decades, and in places the book turns into a campaign ad for the Obama presidency....
Rising Chicago hyperpop sensation Fraxiom had a hell of a weekend. On Saturday, they performed alongside the likes of Charli XCX, 100 Gecs, Aaron Cartier, and Clairo as part of Appleville, a virtual festival organized by PC Music founder A.G. Cook. And on Sunday, Fraxiom dropped their second EP of the year, Feeling Cool and Normal, a deliriously joyful collision of grainy, blown-out bass, jittery synths, chipper vocals pitch-shifted wildly in every direction, and sentimental acoustic strumming—the combination works especially well on “This Guitar,” with its “third-wave emo at the rave” vibe....
Theater communities in Chicago and across the country reacted swiftly to the publication of this week’s Reader cover story—”At Profiles Theatre, the drama—and abuse—is real“—condemning the alleged abuses at the north-side storefront theater and standing behind a group that has emerged to protect non-Equity theater professionals. In addition, Anna D. Shapiro, artistic director of Steppenwolf Theatre, posted a statement of solidarity on behalf of her company: Thursday afternoon, playwright Vern Thiessen commented on the story: Profiles Theatre’s business license expires next Wednesday, June 15....
Euclid This Friday, prolific LA noise artist John Wiese comes to Constellation in support of his new album, Deviation From Balance (you can read more about it in Peter Margasak’s Soundboard write-up). If you’re going, make sure to get there in time to see the opening act, Bay Area instrumental-synth sorceress Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith. On her latest album, Euclid (Western Vinyl), Smith creates intricate, hypnotizing, glowing synth patterns that crawl around each other in serpentine movements....
A chair is still a chair, even if there’s no one sitting there. And it came early on in the 58 minutes and 40 seconds he spent speaking atop the House Chamber dais. In context, the president’s mention of gun violence suggests that the issue remains on the agenda—a hedging way of offering acknowledgment while noting that he’d spend more time “focusing on the future” for the duration of the address....
As one decade turns into the next, I find myself struggling with one of the great existential questions of our time: Which version of “Betcha By Golly, Wow” is best—the Stylistics’s or Prince’s? But I’m going to try to look on the bright side, starting with national politics . . . In short, my argument is that Democrats are better off vigilantly defending their values in a fight with a despicable Republican than watering them down to accommodate the nervous nellies in a Democratic White House....
On her new third album, That’s How Rumors Get Started, Margo Price spins her modern outlaw-country sound into golden strands of pop-friendly Americana, tackling her critics, rock ’n’ roll mythology, and expectations of success. The LP, which was produced by fellow country renegade Sturgill Simpson, showcases Price’s knack for storytelling that pulls at the heartstrings; its lush, midtempo songs contain tales of love, hope, heartbreak, resilience, and promise despite the uncertainty of change....
Pride North illegally charged a $20 entrance fee to the festival on Sunday, city officials say, drawing ire from a queer community that was desperate to celebrate in person after more than a year of pandemic restrictions. Hadden says she repeatedly spoke to Treacy, who she says denied charging the fees. She says multiple residents called 311, and that Chicago police officers spoke with event workers twice on Sunday about the fees....
As much as we’d like to think that we’re doing everything right, right now, we’re not. Not totally. Created by Mayor Lori Lightfoot in response to the protests last summer that also prompted her to cause Christopher Columbus statues to vanish from public parks, the Monuments Project is led by a 30-member advisory committee that includes artists, architects, scholars, and civic leaders. The monuments range from images of Leif Erikson, Abraham Lincoln, and Columbus, to the golden replica of the “The Republic” that stands in Jackson Park....
Since the early 90s, Steppenwolf Theatre has hosted local performing arts companies in its ever-expanding space on North Halsted. While Garage Rep was solely focused on theatrical productions, LookOut covers a broader range of performances. Both productions also have ties to key players in Steppenwolf’s current season—Plano is directed by Audrey Francis, a Steppenwolf ensemble member most recently seen in Dance Nation, and White was written by James Ijames, who also wrote The Most Spectacularly Lamentable Trial of Miz Martha Washington, which will run semi-concurrently with White at Steppenwolf later this spring....
The Commuter, which is now playing in general release, is top-shelf entertainment, with nail-biting suspense, captivating mystery, and loads of visual imagination. It confirms that Jaume Collet-Serra (Non-Stop, Run All Night, The Shallows) is one of the best genre directors working today. The film features one inspired set piece after another; Collet-Serra takes great pleasure in moviemaking, and his enjoyment is infectious. That the story is wildly implausible doesn’t detract from the immense satisfaction it has to offer....
Winter in a pandemic. The roads obstructed with snow. The sight of the same street outside the same window inside the unchanging footprint of the apartment whose every corner and contour is saturated with a sickening familiarity. The scent of your own breath exhaled back through your mask, fogging windows frozen shut. A year, every day of which brings the same emergency home again. Vaccine. Variants. At the Joffrey Ballet, a new Boléro by company artist Yoshihisa Arai, intended for the company’s spring gala, had just begun the creation process two weeks before the city entered lockdown....
This 2016 musical based on Chazz Palminteri’s 1989 solo show (which itself became a Robert De Niro-directed film in 1993) is a paradox. Palminteri wrote about his own life (when he was known as Calogero) around Belmont Avenue in the Bronx in the 1950s and 1960s, torn between the honest values of his bus driver father, Lorenzo, and the romantic allure of Sonny, the local gangster who runs the neighborhood. Yet it evokes so many other influences—from GoodFellas to West Side Story—that Palminteri’s personal story occasionally feels like a comic riff on earlier tales....
