3-30-07
Change of Line-Up at Lakeshore
It’s all-comedy all the time at the Lakeshore Theatre in a new policy that turns the playhouse into a comedy club. With 330 seats, it will be bigger than any other stand-up venue around, but minus the income-generating tableside bar service (although the Lakeshore has a full bar in the lobby). The new programming was announced in mid-March by owners Chris and Jessica Ritter, Craig Golden and Scott Goodman.
Since purchasing the theatre in 2002, they have both produced and (more often) presented various theatrical and concert attractions at the venue near the southeast corner of Broadway and Belmont, with mixed results. For each success, among them Defending the Caveman and The Water Coolers, there has been a poorly-marketed counterpart (not necessarily the fault of the owners) such as Hedwig and the Angry Inch and Puppetry of the Penis.
As a comedy venue, the Lakeshore will be a weekend house for the most part, focusing on two-night bookings of rising and established comedy and new vaudeville figures from the stand-up circuit, MTV, Comedy Central, “Saturday Night Live,” various sitcoms and the late-night network talk shows. The immediate line-up includes Doug Benson (April 6-7), Julia Sweeney (April 13-14), Mike Birbiglia (April 14) and Doug Stanhope (April 20-21). Within the stand-up mix, the Lakeshore also will present some theatrical sketch comedy groups, such as The Idiots (April 11-12), Sit ‘n’ Spin (April 27-28) and Cynthia Carle and Mark Nutter in Alphabetical Order (May 2-3). Tickets for all attractions are modestly priced, ranging from $15 to $25.
Chris Ritter continues as artistic director of the Lakeshore, with national comedy heavyweight Paul Provenza acting as advisor. A weekly Saturday midnight show, to be produced by Ritter and Adam Kozlowski, will spotlight local variety talent under the label of Col. Ritter’s Spectacular Hour of Wonderment (SHOW).
March is the month that out-of-town playwrights of stature have come to town to speak: David Henry Hwang appeared at the Cultural Center March 7, Stephen Flaherty spoke at Bailiwick March 19, Mark Medoff spoke at Infamous Commonwealth Theatre (at the Storefront Theater) on March 22 and Pearl Cleage appeared at Eclipse March 23-24 (at the Victory Gardens Greenhouse). Each distinguished author, of course, has a play currently running at the venue where he or she spoke. Hwang’s play, Golden Child, is on stage at the Silk Road Theatre Project.
An outfit in Las Vegas – no, not the Outfit in Las Vegas – tried to steal Bailiwick Repertory’s thunder over the American premiere of Jerry Springer the Opera, May 14-July 8. Why else would they bother to send a Chicago theatre writer such as moi a big, fat press release trumpeting the show’s “preview in Las Vegas at the MGM Grand”? The preview was in the form of a concert staging of the work, presented March 17-18 as a benefit for Golden Rainbow, a Las Vegas HIV/AIDS charity.
Bailiwick artistic director David Zak is aware that Avalon Productions, the licensor of Jerry Springer the Opera, is actively shopping the rights to various American theatre companies, so he took the Vegas event in stride. To Avalon’s credit, they preserved Bailiwick’s right to claim it as the North American premiere (vs. preview).
Veteran entertainment publicist Cathy Taylor has left The Silverman Group, where she was a vice-president, to set up her own shop, Cathy Taylor Public Relations, Inc. Taylor expects to begin with two clients, Writers’ Theatre and Northlight Theatre, both of whom she repped at The Silverman Group. Taylor can be reached at 312/564-9564, or cathy@cathytaylorpr.com. She also has a Web site under construction, www.cathytaylorpr.com. Before joining The Silverman Group, Taylor was the in-house media guru at Steppenwolf Theatre Company. We wish her well.
The Trap Door Theatre has been invited to perform in May at three international theatre festivals in Arad, Sibiu and Bucharest, Romania. Bucharest, in the southern part of the country, is Romania’s capital; Arad is in the extreme West near the border with Hungary; and Sibiu is smack-dab in central Romania, high in the Transylvanian Alps. The troupe will present Matei Visniec’s Old Clown Wanted. Trap Door held a fundraiser March 25 at Martyr’s but still would welcome any contributions towards the Romanian tour.
Leaving Iowa, the family comedy by Spike Manton and Tim Clue, closes April 8 after a full year’s run at the Royal George Theatre. Word is, however, that a tour is in the works, possibly with some cast replacements. The show features original music by Bruce Roper of Sons of the Never Wrong.
You just can’t keep a dead Hamlet down: actor Jeffrey Carlson, who played the title role in Hamlet for director Terry Hands at Chicago Shakespeare Theater last season, takes on the role again for director Michael Kahn at Washington D.C.’s Shakespeare Theatre Company, June 5-July 29. You’d think that man would be tired of talking so fast.