2-2-07
Thinking About Immigration
Remy Bumppo Theatre Company, now in its 11th year, has announced the launch of an inter-theatre outreach program the troupe has dubbed thinkTank. The company intends to make thinkTank a yearly event, describing it as “an annual theatrical exploration of an issue vital to Chicagoans.” For this inaugural year, the issue will be immigration, and it will be explored March 22-April 15 via a world premiere play, a children’s show, three staged readings and a nightly moderated discussion.
The centerpiece world premiere play is An Immigrant Class, a dramatization of first-person stories of recent Chicago immigrants from the book by Jeff Libman. It’s being adapted by Remy Bumppo associate artistic director Shawn Douglass. Libman himself will be among the speakers engaging the audience in discussion following every performance. The roster of speakers (still in formation) is being drawn from many academic, government, religious and social institutions, such as the University of Chicago Human Rights Program, Interfaith Refugee & Immigration Ministries, Chicago History Museum and the Service Employees International Union.
Collaborating with Remy Bumppo on thinkTank are the Children’s Museum of Immigration (I didn’t know there was such an institution, did you?), Rasaka Theatre Company, Silk Road Theatre Project and Teatro Vista, each of which will offer a free event (reservations required) on a Saturday or Sunday during the run of An Immigrant Class.
The idea for thinkTank came out of a process of self-examination among Remy Bumppo ensemble artists and management during last year’s 10th anniversary season. Says Douglass, there was a desire “to extend our mission by reaching beyond our current audience and begin a more active engagement with the community.” The 10th anniversary also stimulated development of a long-term plan for the company; a plan that still is in process. Remy Bumppo has engaged an outside consultant to work with its board, company members and subscribers to explore everything from artistic policies, to management continuity, to company location.
The Internet quickly has become the source for information on the performing arts, and increasingly for the purchase of tickets. Just about every theatre troupe in town has its own Web site, and a few troupes have little proof of their existence except their Web sites. In addition to company-specific Web sites, savvy local theatre types know there are a number of Internet sites to which they can turn for comprehensive theatre info, from the League of Chicago Theatres’ chicagplays.com, to TheaterMania.com, centerstagechicago.com, illyria.com, chicagoreader.com and, of course, performink.com.
Less well known, perhaps, is the fact that there are several online sources for comprehensive local information specifically on dance, music and even poetry. The Chicago-based Poetry Foundation, for example, operates www.PoetryFoundation.org, a comprehensive online poetry archive that engages readers with the world’s great poetry through audio recordings, feature articles and poetry news. Last year, during National Poetry Month (April), the site delivered daily poetry podcasts.
For classical music fans, the Internet cup runneth over. The Chicago Dance and Music Alliance operates chicagoperformances.org, which lists concerts, recitals, classes and instruction and news for more than 150 Alliance member organizations, plus individual members. This is the place to go for detailed information and descriptions about, say, the far-west-suburban Fermilab Arts Series or the free weekly Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concerts.
In partial competition, last March the Arts & Business Council of Chicago launched www.ChicagoClassicalMusic.org as a collaboration between Cedille Records, Chicago a cappella, Chicago Chamber Musicians, Chicago Opera Theater, Chicago Philharmonic, Chicago Sinfonietta, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Elgin Symphony Orchestra, Fulcrum Point New Music Project, Grant Park Music Festival, Light Opera Works, Music of the Baroque, the Ravinia Festival and radio station WFMT. The site was created under the leadership of the Arts & Business Council of Chicago to demonstrate the effectiveness of online communities as a means of engaging arts audiences.
Fully interactive, ChicagoClassicalMusic.org provides tools for site visitors to publish their own reviews, swap concert tickets and discuss music with other listeners. Executive staff members of some of the region’s most prominent classical music organizations contribute to a daily blog on music and the arts, and discuss and debate issues with readers. The site’s limitation is that it provides calendar listings, links and promotion only for its own members. The Silverman Group public relations firm maintains the site.
Dance has its own site, too: SeeChicagoDance.com, launched about 18 months ago by the Chicago Community Trust as part of its Excellence in Dance Initiative, with additional underwriting from the Donnelley, Dreihaus and Joyce foundations and the Prince Charitable Trust. Carol Fox & Associates, the entertainment public relations firm, manages the site, with Hubbard Street Dance Chicago as the partnering fiscal agent. A recent look found over 147 dance events listed between Jan. 24 and June 28, with more being added each week to the spring end of the calendar. The site expects to add a directory of dance instruction in the near future, with detailed bios of each dance teacher including links to their resident troupes.
It’s only taken them six months, but the folks at Playbill finally have kept their promise to provide all-Chicago editorial content. At least they’ve sort-of kept their promise in their three slightly different January Chicago editions. There was a lead feature about Cherry Jones and Doubt, but it was only coincidentally and briefly connected to Chicago through the Jan. 10-28 stop of the national tour. It’s sure to turn up in other editions of Playbill in other cities where the tour stops. Ditto, the article about Blue Man Group, egregiously reprinted for the third time since September, and generically suitable for use in any of the many cities where Blue Man Group is playing. The only story that was categorically “Chicago-centric” – the word Playbill president Philip Birsh repeatedly has used for what the magazine would deliver – was an article about ComedySportz.
Hey, I only observe and comment on these things. If the many Chicago theatres that pay Playbill for program books feel they are adequately served by narrowly-focused and/or shamelessly regurgitated stories, that’s fine with me. But if not, I’d be on the phone complaining to Birsh and his Chicago editor, Thomas Connors. FYI: they’re both in New York. Playbill doesn’t think Chicago requires a locally-based editor.
Jonathan Abarbanel is a freelance writer who contributes regularly to Chicago Footlights, which provides program books to smaller theatres.