The Cripple of Inishmaan

The Druid Theatre Company's The Cripple of Inishmaan at Chicago Shakes. Pretty unrelentingly bleak.

Hercules at Lyric Opera

Only Mr. P went to this one. Peter Sellars directs. Loved it.

"Hercules wears desert camouflage, combat boots and bulky Kevlar vest. Iole appears in a prisoner’s orange jumpsuit, her beautiful face and gleaming blonde hair hidden by a black mesh hood. Hercules’ homecoming party is a backyard barbeque complete with fancy gas grill and plenty of beer."

Same Planet, Different World

The program: "HIT,"by Minneapolis-based choreographer Carl Flink. "He employs a singular, combative image, more an act of aggression, really, as signature motif. The dancers periodically punch each other, directly and often seemingly out of nowhere, as if in challenge or even mild assault."

Mark Morris at Harris

"Socrates" set to Erik Satie's "Socrate"

"Petrichor," Morris' endlessly intricate homage to Heitor Villa-Lobos, for eight women.

"The Muir,"to folk songs scored by Beethoven.

Robert Moses "Kin" at the Dance Center

The boundary-breaking Robert Moses’ Kin presents its remarkable new work exploring the complexities of identity, love and parentage in non-traditional families. The Cinderella Principle: try these on, see if they fit evolved from in-depth interviews with families throughout the San Francisco Bay Area in a first-time collaboration with award-winning playwright Anne Galjour, violinist/composer Todd Reynolds and DJ/ beat boxer Kid Beyond. Also on the program:Toward September, a powerful full-company work about the divine impulse behind artistic creation; and Approaching Thought

Merry Widow at Joffrey

So we have great, great seats for our Joffrey subscription, but story ballets weren't exactly why we signed up. This was fun but didn't knock the socks off. Dinner at Mercat for restaurant week before was really fun, though.

Mark Morris at Mandel Hall

Always entertaining Mark Morris.

Choreographer Mark Morris talks with Princeton musicologist Simon Morrison.

As You Like It at Chicago Shakes

We were slightly mixed on this. I have a tiny little crush on Kate Fry who played Rosalind, so I thought she was terrific, but Ms. S was less enamored. Overall, the show was elegant without being fussy. And a nice twist with both Rosalind and Orlando splitting the epilogue.

Odradeck at House

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.

So, someone got sick in the middle of the performance and they had to pause the show, one of my guests didn't take well to the gore and had to step out and frankly, after the pause, the audience acted like they were at a baseball game, coming and going at will. Dark. Onward, my House friends.

Three Tall Women at Court

Totally unfamiliar with this script. Some outstanding performance, and the Court is always solid.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at Steppenwolf

Wow. Thinking, really, really we can't, can't see this show again.

And then Steppenwolf blew it out of the water. Letts and Morton were extraordinary, and a really nice, surprising interpretation of Honey by Carrie Coon.















From Chris Jones's review in the Tribune:

"In most productions of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" Edward Albee's infamous 1962 drama of mutual marital self-loathing in a college town, the character of Martha comes off as an inveterate, addicted game player. She's usually a natural-born boxer who, on this famous booze-soaked night, heads once again with relish into the ring with her marital sparring partner and fails only to anticipate the atypical scale of the impending mutual destruction.

"But in Pam MacKinnon's unusual but wholly fascinating new production for the Steppenwolf Theatre Company, the illustrious Chicago company's first-ever foray into Albee and a much-anticipated pairing of Tracy Letts and Amy Morton, that's not the way it plays out at all. Morton's Martha — far more naturalistic, far more normative, for more quickly vulnerable than usual — is a demonstrably reluctant manipulator. She plays "Get the Guests" and brings up that famous imagined baby, mostly, it feels, because it's the only way of keeping the lid on the house neurotic, to whom she happens to be married. And who is half-cocked and might go off at any moment."

Eight Blackbird at MCA

More my cup of tea than Ms. S's, but nice to see more performance at the MCA.














"The Grammy-winning eighth blackbird returns to MCA Stage with the fascinating and provocative series PowerFUL/LESS. These two concerts are inspired by Stravinsky's quote, "Music is essentially powerless to express anything at all." PowerFUL, confronts the audience with a program of passionate and politically charged works featuring Mr. Tambourine Man by John Corigliano with soprano Katie Calcamuggio, Coming Together by Frederic Rzewski, and John Luther Adams' The Light Within."

Betontanc and Umka.lv at MCA

This was a wonderful surprise.

Betontanc, a Slovinian dance company and and Umka.lv a Latvian puppet theater company follows the "seemingly insignificant and faceless person named Little Branko travels through the 20th century with a marvelous voice that rivets the world’s leaders."

http://mcachicago.org/performances/past/all/2011/620

Bookclub: McTeague

Ms. B-H's choice and Ms. B was the host. A weird book, but glad to have it on our list.

Emerson String Quartet

Nice program with fragments of two unfinished works by Haydn and Mendelssohn: the Quartet in D minor, Op. 103, and, respectively, the “Andante and Scherzo,” Op. 81.











From the Sun-Times review:

"With Hyde Park looking like a snow globe on Friday night, Mandel Hall warmly showcased the 30-plus year old ensemble in top form. The program was compelling and ranged seamlessly from the sweetly propulsive music of Mendelssohn to the bleakly lunar soundscapes of Alban Berg. Yet it was a distinct Emerson specialty — Debussy’s magnificent G Minor Quartet (1893) — that left everyone hypnotized. Here was a dynamic performance where a perfectly good encore — in Friday’s case, the scherzo from Mendelssohn’s Op. 44, No. 3 — almost spoiled the palate."