3-31-06
Wit in Abundance
Regular PerformInk readers know that Jeremy Wechsler, artistic director of Theater Wit, has authored a series of columns for this paper on the challenges of acquiring and developing a theatre venue. His own Space Odyssey now is on public display as Theater Wit has unveiled plans for a 10,000 square foot facility with two theatres in the 5600 block of Broadway. The program of Theater Wit’s current production, Two for the Show, devotes several pages to the new facility, including several renderings. Indeed, with 90 percent of the $850,000 price tag for the retrofit already pledged, construction has begun with occupancy predicted by the end of this calendar year.
However, the real news is that Theater Wit is negotiating hot ‘n’ heavy with The Artistic Home to be the second resident company in the space. Wechsler and Artistic Home cofounders Kathy Scambiatterra and John Mossman confirm that contracts have been drawn up, although not yet signed. All three express their enthusiasm for a swift completion. The proposal calls for the Artistic Home to sign a two-year lease, and have at its disposal a theatre of approximately 50 seats (slightly larger than its current space on Irving Park Road), plus a separate classroom studio for acting classes.
New York based Bernard Telsey will handle casting for the Chicago first national company of The Color Purple, says lead producer Scott Sanders. The dates for a Chicago call haven’t been set, but it should be in late summer. The company will open at the Cadillac Palace next April for a minimum of seven months. Broadway in Chicago execs are being coy and won’t speak of a commitment beyond three months, but Sanders will. In fact, Sanders told Behind the Curtain, the Chicago run will be open-ended. If the business is here, the troupe will do a Wicked thing and a second national company will be formed to fulfill touring dates, the first of which (after Chicago) will be Los Angeles.
Fresh from the widely-publicized controversy surrounding his play, Somebody Foreign, author Douglas Post finds himself in a similar and potentially bigger stew over his newest, The Kingdom of Grimm, a musical for which Post received the first Cunningham Commission for Youth Theatre from The Theatre School, DePaul. Post wrote book, music and lyrics for the work, drawing on classic stories of enchantment by the Brothers Grimm. Almost immediately, three trolls, two giants, a witch and the entire guild of gingerbread bakers threatened a lawsuit over right-to-privacy issues.
Said the witch, “I’m the first to admit I wasn’t a very good neighbor, back when I lived deep in the woods. Well, I paid the price when those Grimm boys made my life a living hell. Now I run a respectable potions business in Andersonville, and Post has no right to dig up the past and haul me through the mud!” Post, for his part, claims the witch’s tale was published years ago and now is within the public domain.
The Theatre School has stuck by Post, going forward as planned with the March 28-May 20 world premiere of The Kingdom of Grimm as part of the Playworks series at the Merle Reskin Theatre. However, the entire DePaul University board of trustees has resigned in protest. When will Post learn, eh? Make it up, Doug, make it up!
Tooting Our Own Horn Dept. The three-week run of Sita Ram at Lookingglass Theatre Company was sold out before the show opened. Well, with fewer than 4,000 seats available it’s not surprising, given the high profile and extensive mailing lists of Lookingglass and its collaborators, Natya Dance Theatre and the Chicago Children’s Choir. The crucial element, however, is that Sita Ram is drawing a substantial South Asian audience to Lookingglass for the first time. This is where we Toot Our Horn: we knew they would. Yours truly was the first critic in Chicago to observe and predict—nearly three years ago—that the next big, untapped theatre audience in Chicago was within our Asian communities.
Shortly thereafter, the success of The Romance of Magno Rubio at Victory Gardens, the sold-out performances at the Silk Road Theatre Project and the SRO staged readings at Rasaka Theatre Company began to confirm my prediction. Then, I put other peoples’ money where my mouth was when I co-produced The Masrayana last fall, a co-venture of Rasaka and Prop Theatre. Without spending a dime on advertising, we saw attendance rise every week but one, and our box office receipts nearly triple between Week One and Week Six (a sold-out week). We extended for a strong seventh week before closing (four principals had other work). To my delight, our audiences consistently were among the most diverse I’ve known in theatre, drawing patrons of Asian and European descent in nearly equal numbers. There’s a lesson to be learned here, and it’s not just that I’m always right and you should listen to me, though, of course, I am and you should.
David Schwimmer is rehearsing in New York for his Broadway debut in the first Broadway revival in 25 years of The Caine Mutiny Court Martial, under estimable director Jerry Zaks. Schwimmer stars as Lt. Barney Greenwald, the young naval officer on trial for mutiny against his captain, Commander Queeg (played by Zeljko Ivanek). Also making his Broadway debut in the show is Joe Sikora, who’s been getting a lot of screen work since leaving Chicago. Previews begin April 14 with the opening set for May 7.
They rang down the curtain—except there isn’t a curtain—for the last time Sunday, March 26, as I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change ended a three-and-a-half year run at the Royal George Theatre. That’s 1,437 performances, a lott’a love, too much perfection and just the right amount of change.
We hear the Wilmette Theatre, a film house in the suburb of the same name, has been sold and that the new owners intend to present live theatre and musical performances there. A closing date on the purchase is about a month away.
The movie poster shows two twentysomething Southern Cal slackers, one of them bare-chested, and three bimbettes. But it was the advertising line that rang a bell: “Duke wants Olivia who likes Sebastian who’s really Viola . . . who’s crushing on Duke who thinks she’s a guy.” Sure enough, the poster for She’s the Man says “Inspired by the play Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare,” whose name is as big as the producer’s and director’s. Does this mean Will’s story credit is protected by the WGA? Does it make him eligible for a Golden Globe or an Oscar? If he wins, who gets the statue? University of Chicago Shakespeare scholar David Bevington confirmed that Shakespeare has no living descendents.