Puppetry both limits and frees, allowing the embodiment of all sorts of fantastical notions, but never approaching the emotional investment a skilled actor can invoke. Both sides of that particular coin are presently on display in Redmoon Theatre's latest offering--The Cabinet.

Inspired by the silent film Das Kabinett des Doktor Caligari, this story of horror tells of a somnambulist who falls into the hands of a maniacal doctor at a mental institution. The doctor, referred to as The Director, compels his patient to perform actions that would be inimical to his very nature--in particular, murder. The patient murders two victims, but the third somehow causes him to finally awake fully, but briefly. We then learn that, perhaps, this all was some sort of fantasy designed to force the patient to wakefulness, but as it did not completely succeed, the patient will be compelled to repeat the pattern over and over.

Set completely in an actual cabinet--more a chest of drawers really--director Frank Maugeri creates a series of miniature scenes to invoke the patient's drowsing world. Puppeteers in white face and monocles control the characters, using tweezers and forceps to manipulate the puppets and their props. Everything appears in black and white, with a few exceptions: a flower exchanged between lovers; a bird the patient kills in an early experiment by The Director. The Cabinet remains visually arresting throughout.

It doesn't usually manage, though, to catch the audience's emotions. In many ways, this is a one-note story. The patient has no control. He tells us from the beginning that he will be made to do horrible things. And he does. The fact that he will somehow repeat this pattern in a sort of Sartre-esque hell-on-earth lacks a real emotional punch. And the limitations of the puppetry mean that the actual violence remains somewhat awkward. Because we watch puppets tell this story, we don't see much of an emotional journey and, in essence, that's what this story is. A spiral into the depths, followed by a brief escape and a final crash.

Still, Redmoon has captured a true sense of the somnambulist's world. Colm O'Reilly, as the narrator and voice of the patient, has a heaviness of tone that suits this story. The deliberate nature of the puppet's movements evokes the rhythm of a sleepwalker. The audience falls into a trance-like state that mirrors the patient's own. It's almost enough for us to identify completely with the patient's journey...but not quite.

The Cabinet--Redmoon Theater

Michael Phillips, Tribune--"The inmates of the asylum are running the puppet show, and in the comfort of your own straitjacket it's a wonderful sight to behold...The Cabinet, which is a spectacular miniature on its own as well as a wryly comic theatrical answer to the film, is a horror show of a peculiarly mournful sort. As usual for Redmoon shows, after it's over you're invited to step backstage. None of which dispels the power of the illusions you've just seen. You may find yourself thinking about any number of haunting images the next day."

Hedy Weiss, Sun-Times--"A spellbinding dreamscape, it packs so much visual beauty, engineering skill, imagination, storytelling, emotion and magic into its hypnotic 65 minutes that by its end you wish you could rewind the whole mesmerizing experience and play it again to catch anything you may have missed... The 'stage' in the wonderfully intimate studio theatre of The Viaduct is actually a massive antique wardrobe with doors and drawers at off-kilter, cubist angles. Each of these 'windows' opens to reveal a smaller stage, or a shadow puppet screen, or a retractable ramp, or a pop-up book or some other strangely distorted space in which scale and direction are further warped thanks to the wondrous acrobatics of the live puppeteers."

Brian Nemtusak, Reader--"A better fit with Redmoon's aesthetic is hardly imaginable. And longtime Maher collaborator Colm O'Reilly--black prince of Curious and Oobleck, whose trembling, portentous, static-shrouded voice is piped in from what seems a thousand miles away--is probably the perfect narrator. Yet somehow the show struggles not to be dull. Maybe it's that it's played exceptionally straight--there's precious little of Maher's morbid whimsy in evidence. But if things hit a high pitch only in the closing moments, the music and puppetry are excellent throughout, and Maher unearths his usual share of transfixing paradoxes along the way. A near miss."

Nina Metz, New City--"In thinking small, the creators of Redmoon Theatre's The Cabinet have devised something larger than is first apparent in this adaptation of the 1919 silent horror film, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. The result is a wholly absorbing puppet show of the most intricate precision--by far one of the strongest productions (puppet or otherwise) in the city right now. The black-and-white original was a freak fest of Expressionism, and director Frank Maugeri and playwright Mickle Maher imbue this production with a similar cinematic feel."

Jonathan Abarbanel, Windy City--"For all the dazzling craft, however, I was emotionally engaged only occasionally. One marvels at the artistry, the creation of beautiful or bizarre objects, the delightful mixture of many puppetry techniques and toy theatre, the ingenuity of it all, but none of that made me feel the story over all. Perhaps it's the slow and deliberate pace that's a Redmoon hallmark, but I've had a similar reaction to much of the troupe's work over many years. Yet there have been exceptions that have pulled my heart and soul into their aura, such as the moving adaptation of The Old Man and the Sea several seasons ago. The Cabinet doesn't do that; still, few troupes astonish and touch the senses as Redmoon does, and that's good enough.

Leaving Iowa--Theatre Building Chicago

Nina Metz, Tribune--"If the debatable pleasures of the family road trip prove anything, it is that, if you hated it as a kid, you'll probably feel nostalgia for it as an adult. This is what drives Tim Clue and Spike Manton's Wonder Years-like comedy Leaving Iowa, an ode to the days when families piled into battleship-size station wagons and set out to visit rarely seen corners of our country... While the jokes have an easy, unforced quality, the show is too long by 45 minutes. Occasionally, it strays into the mawkish land of Tuesdays With Morrie. But that didn't hamper the success of that book (and subsequent TV movie and play). And it shouldn't hamper the success of Leaving Iowa."

Kevin Nance, Sun-Times--"If you've ever been on one of those long road trips with your family, touring the majestic but not exactly action-packed heartland of America in a station wagon, you've already reached midpoint on the way toward an appreciation of Leaving Iowa, the hilarious and heart-tugging family comedy by Chicago playwrights Tim Clue and Spike Manton. This poignantly nostalgic play, now receiving a modest but expert production at Theatre Building Chicago, suffers slightly from a relative shortage of conflict and continually flirts with sentimentality. But as directed by Clue, it skirts these pitfalls with sharp observation, carefully calibrated comic sequences and a pitch-perfect, iconic performance by the great Chicago actor Bradley Armacost."

Nick Green, Reader--"Halfway through the journey of getting his father's cremains buried at a designated spot in Iowa, the journalist protagonist of Tim Clue and Spike Manton's comedy says, "I'm not sure how, and I'm not sure when, but we're going to see this done." An hour and four or five endings later the story of Leaving Iowa gets resolved, tying a neat bow on a play that's all about futility. Howie Johnson steals the show in a series of bit parts while Bradley Armacost as the mathematically minded father is wonderfully expressive, despite spending half his time on stage in stark silence. You can't argue with the script's subject, the omnipresent gravitational pull between father and son, but the sleepy tempo of Clue's staging bears looking at."

Scott C. Morgan, Windy City--"It's a great American vacation tradition: Kids trapped in the backseat of a car pestering their parents by repeatedly asking, 'Are we there yet?' You may find yourself asking that same question at times during Leaving Iowa, a much-acclaimed comedy by local playwrights Tim Clue and Spike Manton now in its Chicago debut after a string of regional engagements. Like many family road trips, Leaving Iowa meanders along a bit too long in spots, making you wonder why and where you're going on this journey. Thankfully, the sentimental and touching conclusion of Leaving Iowa makes the trip very worthwhile."

Reparation--Profiles Theatre

Chris Jones, Tribune--"To its credit, the long-established Profiles Theatre is willing to do shows that most other theatres would not dare touch. In the past, this little troupe's willingness to probe the dark side of violence and sexuality has resulted in some memorably challenging theatre. The Profiles production of David Schulner's Reparation is not one of those occasions. This wretched, nasty show makes for a horrible evening--and it doesn't have any clue how to deal appropriately with the serious issues it raises."

Hedy Weiss, Sun-Times--"Is David Schulner's new play, Reparation, a Titus Andronicus for the 21st century, an extreme work that produces more shock therapy than even Shakespeare himself could administer? Or is the play--now in its world premiere at Profiles Theatre, under the direction of Rich Cotovsky--a kind of soft-core pornography for this age of greed, amorality and globalization? Is Reparation a genuine protest against injustice, or just an outrageous act of exploitation that traffics in grotesque titillation and its own virulent form of ethnic destruction? All I can tell you is that walking out of the theatre I felt rage--and a severe disconnect between Schulner's tactics and his purported message."

Jenn Goddu, Reader--"David Schulner's purposely ugly new play, in which a wealthy man abuses his power to rid his body of disease, aims to consider responsibility on the personal, corporate, and global levels. But under Richard Cotovsky's direction, Darrell W. Cox as the physically ill, sickly malevolent rich man is so good at oozing unscrupulousness that we wonder why the other characters get drawn into his scheme. His bodyguard is loyal and wants to get paid. OK. But it's impossible to understand why the man's lawyer (Joe Jahraus) and his unfortunate victim (Sean Nix) would get involved with this guy. Instead of wondering whether we'd do what they're doing, exploring the morality of their actions, we keep asking ourselves why they're doing these things."

Tim Sauers, Gay Chicago--" Randolph employs Berman (the overly zealous Jahraus), his indebted lawyer, to run what surely is his last business transaction, this saving of his life using the blood from the African. Though, when pondering what Schulner wishes to communicate, it might not be about this at all. Randolph may only be torturing the African for his own benefit. The material is written quite cryptically, keeping the audience guessing the whole time as to the situation at hand. The action and thought imbedded in the writing never progress[es] into anything emotionally and intellectually stimulating."

Swing!--Marriott Theatre

Michael Phillips, Tribune--"With a cast blending many Swing! veterans of Broadway and the road with some strong Chicago talent, the show goes down easy. The Marriott's scale and in-the-round ambience feels right. The results are murder. In fact, the production's solid murder. The opening-night audience blew their tops and their wigs... Swing! doesn't shape its source material in dazzling ways, but the raw material is more than enough. The Marriott staging directed by Marc Robin moves like quicksilver. Robin and his co-choreographers, Mark Stuart Eckstein and Beverly Durand, transform the Marriott stage into a dynamic cube of perpetual motion."

Hedy Weiss, Sun-Times--"Swing! contains some of the most buoyant, inventive, eye-popping choreography--and some of the most knockout, joint-defying and infectiously bravura dancing--to be seen on this or any other side of Broadway at the moment. It's also got a band (led by dynamite musical director Doug Oberhamer) that will knock your socks off. And it has four singers--that exquisite, octave-spanning mood weaver Susan Moniz, that quintessential 1940s band singer and scat master Roberta Duchak, the smooth-stepping Bernie Yvon and the goofily eager Matt Pearson--to make things alternately mellow and madcap."

Laura Molzahn, Reader--"Half the 16 dancers here have done Lynne Taylor-Corbett's 30s and 40s revue on Broadway or in a national tour, and it shows: the performances are top notch. And occasionally the take on a standard is clever, as when Roberta Duchak sings "Cry Me a River" accusingly to an onstage trombonist--who replies. The dancing can be impressive, especially when executed by choreographers Beverly Durand and Mark Stuart Eckstein (director Marc Robin is the third). Durand who appeared in Forever Tango slices the air like a knife. But when the pace slows and the mood is supposed to be sexy or serious, the choreography flounders. Moreover, the dated material is played uberstraight."

Quote of the Fortnight:

"When did the English become so boring?"--Jack Helbig reviewing Remy Bumppo's Humble Boy in the Reader.