“1001 Nights,” by the British theater director Tim Supple, was commissioned by Toronto’s Luminato Festival and was supposed to open on Navy Pier in Chicago June 25.

TORONTO — Luminato, the festival of arts, culture and ideas that just concluded in Canada's largest city, has only been held for four years. But this citywide extravaganza already attracts a collective audience in excess of 1 million and spends millions of dollars on the commissioning of expansive international creations like Tim Supple's “1001 Nights,” a show that used 24 actors from across the Middle East and that was supposed to then come to the Chicago Shakespeare Theater before visa issues killed, or at least postponed, the booking.

But for all the lofty artistic aims spoken at Luminato, which claims to be the largest multi-arts festival in North America, one message here rings the loudest and the clearest: This festival was created to promote its home city and build its cultural prestige around the globe. Or, as the manifesto of the co-founders puts it: “to shine Toronto's light on the world and the world's light on Toronto.” You can't say it much clearer than that.

Surely, there are several lessons here for Chicago, a city that desperately wants to improve its international reputation and currently minimal share of foreign tourists. According to figures from the U.S. Department of Commerce, Chicago's share of international visitors to the U.S. actually shrank between 2009 and 2010: from 4.7percent to 4.5 percent, a share already below that of much smaller cities like Boston. In 2010, Toronto attracted roughly 2 1/2 times as many international visitors as Chicago.

THEATER REVIEW: "Beauty and the Beast" ★★½ Through Aug. 7 at the Oriental Theatre, 24 W. Randolph St.; Running time: 2 hours, 25 minutes; $18-$85 at 800-775-2000 or broadwayinchicago.com

I'm not the most enthusiastic welcoming committee when non-Equity tours of Broadway musicals such as “Beauty and the Beast” land in one of the major Loop houses like the Oriental Theatre, especially for a six-week run.

While these low-cost productions have a role in bringing tours to smaller cities, New York would erupt with howls of protest if such a production landed on Broadway. I fail to see why downtown Chicago should be any different. Especially when there is little or no disclosure of the distinction in promotion materials and no meaningful reduction in ticket prices. “Beauty and the Beast” will cost you up to $85 for the best seats, though discounts are out there.

What “non-Equity” (or non-union) means is that you're seeing actors who have never done a Broadway show (this at Broadway in Chicago) and are, most likely, just a year or two out of training and on their first tour (older actors tend to come from the light-opera world or a variety of international or nonprofessional backgrounds). These shows are massive profit centers when they sell well, because their costs are but a fraction of, say, “Billy Elliot” or “Wicked” — to name two top-tier shows that once filled this most fabulous of Chicago venues. Much of the orchestra you hear striking up most of Alan Menken's wonderful score is housed inside a computer. It ain't so much a matter of raising a baton as hitting “play.”

Just as the sun starts coming out in Chicago, so do a couple of terrific new plays.

The Goodman Theatre is just completing a season dominated by ambitious world premieres: "Stage Kiss" from Sarah Ruhl, "Mary" by Thomas Bradshaw, "El Nogalar" by Tanya Saracho. But while all of these shows had their merits, it has taken until the last show of the season for the Goodman to really have a hit. David Henry Hwang's "Chinglish" is that rare and desirable theatrical beast that's culturally wise, thematically complex and politically timely — but also enough of a good time that if you head over to Dearborn Street directly from the office, you won't feel like you've shelled out money to take part in some kind of academic, after-hours seminar.

You'll actually have a number of good laughs. Trust me on that.

Continue reading "Two worthy new summer plays: 'Chinglish' and 'The Homosexuals'"

In her Tribune column today, Nina Metz takes a detailed look at the filming of "Boss," the promising, made-in-Chicago new Starz TV show starring Kelsey Grammer and concerning a fictional mayor of Chicago.

Along with a re-creation of an entire floor of City Hall, she finds a lot of familiar names from Chicago theater on the set: John Judd, Craig Spidle, Kevin Gudahl, Ron OJ Parson and Carmen Roman, who gets thrown under a bus by the boss. 

Metaphorically speaking.

 
IN PERFORMANCE: Cirque du Soleil's "Ovo" ★★★½ Through Aug. 21 at the United Center, 1901 W. Madison St.; Tickets: $60-$130 at 800-678-5440 or www.cirquedusoleil.com

Insects are such a good match for the Cirque du Soleil, you have to wonder why those scurrying around that famous Montreal hive had not thought of them before.

In years of reviewing Cirque shows, from “Nouvelle Experience” on, this is the first time that Cirque's contortionists have made dramatic sense. In every other show, you admire the twists and turns, spend a few seconds pondering your own ever-growing inability to do even a fraction of the same, and then wonder not so much where those arms and legs might be going next as why they would be going there. Yet in Deborah Colker's distinctive, fresh and curious “Ovo,” which hatched a summer Chicago run Wednesday night, you actually get to see these performers create a slew of spiders, to name but one of the bugs under the creative microscope. Or so it seems. Some of the appendages display the kind of mutative powers that make the term “leg” redundant.

“Ovo” is my favorite Cirque show in a couple of years. “Viva Elvis,” the newest Las Vegas show, is trapped in the celebration of authorized Elvis, hindering creativity. The less said about the disastrous “Banana Shpeel” the better. In Vegas, Cirque now tends to split the demographic, offering different kinds of shows for different kinds of people (up next: Michael Jackson). Its track record in proscenium theaters remains mixed. And who wants to see Cirque is some sterile suburban arena?

But the first-run tent shows — “Ovo” is the latest in a long and very distinguished line that have been coming to Chicago for two decades — retain a certain purity of vision and connection to the company's outdoor roots. Gifted artists such as Colker, a major figure in contemporary Brazilian dance, are generally left alone to do their thing. The experience for an audience is intimate, yet full of spectacle. And for Cirque, the canvas is secured by 25 years of creativity.

"Ovo" is the new touring production by Cirque du Soleil.

In her native Brazil, Deborah Colker is a widely acclaimed choreographer with a long-established dance company, Companhia de Danca Deborah Colker. But Colker is also the director of Cirque du Soleil's touring tent show, “Ovo,” which opens Wednesday in Parking Lot K, next to the United Center on Chicago's Near West Side. It'll be in Chicago all summer.

Q: So you just arrived in Chicago from Brazil?

A: I love this city. This is my first time here and it's really a great surprise. Nobody knows how is Chicago. It's a little like New York, but nicer, cleaner. Really, I didn't know. I expected to see Don Corleone.

Q: Your show is about insects. Why insects?

A: At my first meeting with Guy Laliberte (Cirque's CEO), he told me he wanted to have a show about nature and biodiversity. I asked if it must be political and he said, “No, it's an artistic show.” So I had this idea to do a show about insects.

Q: They don't get much respect.

A: No. If we see an ant we stomp on it. Butterflies we respect. But insects are so small and so important. They are part of our world all the time.

Q: How do they translate into a show?

A: Well, for example, I wanted to find a relationship between acrobats and insects. How they fly. How they run. Insects have six legs or eight legs, and it's the same with the acrobats. They have more legs than usual people. And then, as well as the movement, there is the personality of the insects. Some can be nice and beautiful. Some can be horrible and dangerous. I wanted to put a lens in their small world.

The Steppenwolf Theatre Company has announced its slate of plays for the upcoming "First Look Repertory of New Works," a script-development project that premieres new work in modestly scaled productions. This year's line-up includes:

• "Man in Love" by Christina Anderson. Robert O'Hara directs a new play set in the 1930s.
• "Want" by Zayd Dohrn. A piece about former junkies and sex addicts in group therapy.
• "Oblivion" by Carly Mensch ("Weeds"). A play about trendy Brooklyn parents with a tricky teenage daughter.

First Look runs from Oct. 26 to Nov. 11 in the Steppenwolf Garage, 1624 N. Halsted St.

The upcoming Marriott Theatre premiere of the new musical "For the Boys" (opening Aug. 26) has cast its two leads. The Broadway performers Timothy Gulan (left)  and Michele Ragusa will play, respectively, Eddie Sparks and Dixie Leonard.

"For the Boys" is based on the 1991 Bette Midler movie, as adapted for the stage by Aaron Thielen.  Marc Robin directs and choreographs. Set in the 1940s, the show uses numbers from the great American songbook.

Others in the mostly Chicago-based cast are Anne Gunn, Summer Smart, Michael Lindner, Bernie Yvon, Johanna McKenzie Miller, Holly Stauder, Michael Weber, Melissa Zaremba, Katheryn Patton, Rod Thomas, Jameson Cooper, John Michael Coppola, Alex Goodrich, Karl Hamilton, Andrew Mueller, Brandon Springman, Zachary Keller, Johnny Rabe and Daniel Coonley.

 
David Henry Hwang's "Chinglish" plays through July 24 at the Goodman Theatre; more information at www.goodmantheatre.org. Read the Tribune's ★★★★ REVIEW.

Leigh Silverman's production of David Henry Hwang's "Chinglish," which had its world premiere Monday night at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago, will be on Broadway this fall.

The producers are Jeffrey Richards, Jerry Frankel, Roy Gottlieb, Barry and Carole Kaye and David and Barbara Stoller in association with the Goodman. New York's Public Theatre, which initially had this show on its 2011-12 season, participated in the development of the piece.

The show, which does yet have firm dates or a specific theater, is expected to land at one of the Shubert houses. Whether the entire cast will be going to Broadway with the show has not yet been confirmed.

The announcement means that a pair of new plays that emerged from Chicago's two leading theaters will be on Broadway this fall: Lisa D'Amour's "Detroit," which premiered at Steppenwolf Theatre Company, and Hwang's "Chinglish."

Richards and Frankel are producing both shows.

THEATER REVIEW: "Chinglish" ★★★★ Through July 24 at the Goodman Theatre, 170 N. Dearborn St.; 2 hours, 25 minutes; $25-$73 at 312-443-3800 or goodmantheatre.org

At the moment in David Henry Hwang's "Chinglish" when Sino-American business relations develop to the point a Chinese buyer and a U.S. seller find themselves in bed together, you get a sudden flashback to "M. Butterfly." That brilliant 23-year-old drama, which made this playwright's career, explores how Western men have long been vulnerable to the seductive mysteries of the beautiful, er, women of the East. And so, as you watch two bodies move through space in a Chinese hotel room, you first think that Hwang, America's premiere dramatic chronicler of East-West relationships, has returned to an old theme.

Indeed he has. But China has changed and so — we come to see in this shrewd, timely and razor-sharp comedy premiering at the Goodman Theatre and logically headed to Broadway — has Hwang. The power has shifted in one direction only: East. Skyscrapers now abut opera houses. Bullet trains cut through butterfly gardens. And recession-weary American businessman are left salivating over "the greatest pool of untapped consumers history has ever known."

So the vulnerable party in this 2011 tryst is the American, an unhappily married man whose family business is on the point of collapse and whose striving past is pockmarked with the scandals and past moral failings of the American business and banking sectors, screw-ups followed closely in the new provincial China where names like Jeffrey Skilling and Andrew Fastow aren't unfamiliar. China isn't an exotic dalliance for this anxious corporate traveler — it's last-gasp bailout for the desperate.
Meanwhile, the Chinese woman who holds all the cards — and the lucrative contracts — neither flicks her pretty eyes nor looks down like her ancestors. She's in it, and she controls the exchange, entirely for her own purposes and her own sexual pleasure.