Today
Chicago theatre is home to more than 200 small, critically acclaimed theatre companies such as Lifeline Theatre, Remy Bumppo Theatre Company, Redmoon Theater, Trap Door Theatre, and TUTA Theatre. Some have their own performance venues, while many perform in untraditional theatre spaces such as storefronts, public spaces like laundromats or bars, or any number of studio or black box theatres around Chicago.
Touring productions also visit the city regularly, mainly playing at the big theaters in the Chicago Theatre District in the Loop.
Following in the tradition of The Second City and Steppenwolf, many of these companies, including American Blues Theater, Stage Left Theatre, Organic Theater Company, and Lifeline Theatre, are ensemble-based. An ensemble-based company is formed of a group of artists (actors, directors, designers, playwrights, etc.) who work collaboratively to create each production.
Chicago theatre has a long record of introducing new plays and playwrights. Many of the theatres in Chicago have new play workshop programs to cultivate work from current playwrights. Chicago Dramatists, which was begun by a group of ex-students of a playwriting workshop at Victory Gardens Theater, has an ongoing program of developing new writers, most notably Rebecca Gilman.
The Victory Gardens Theater plays host to a dozen resident playwrights and most of the productions there are premieres of their plays, a number of which have gone on to productions elsewhere. Some of these include James Sherman's Beau Jest, Jeffrey Sweet's The Action Against Sol Schumann, Kristine Thatcher's Voice of Good Hope, Charles Smith's Jelly Belly, Steve Carter's Pecong, Claudia Allen's Deed of Trust, and Douglas Post's Earth and Sky.
Stage Left Theatre's Downstage Left program has cultivated nationally known playwrights Mia McCullough, David Rush, Margaret Lewis and David Alan Moore.
Theatre Building Chicago formerly had an ongoing program for the development of new musicals until being taken over by Stage 773 in 2010.
Chicago dell'Arte is local company currently creating and producing new works of Commedia dell'arte. The Company also sponsors and in-house troupe known as Le Corone Rosse.
Polish language productions for Chicago's large Polish speaking population can be seen at the historic Gateway Theatre in Jefferson Park.
Oracle Theatre offers public access theatre in Chicago sustained by the donations, where the seats are free and open to anyone.
Chicago is home to both non-union and union theatre companies. Union shows adhere to strict contracts for all artists involved (e.g., performers, directors, musicians, playwrights, stage managers, et cetera). Artistic trade unions such as Actors' Equity, commonly known simply as "Equity," and the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society bargain for contracts guaranteeing minimum wages and other rights involved with the rehearsal and production process. Chicago theatre shows may run for a varying number of weeks, depending on ticket sales. Musicals tend to have longer runs than do stage plays. The majority of Chicago theatres are located on the city's North Side and downtown, in the Loop.
Both Actor's Equity and non-Equity productions in the Chicago area receive honors from the Joseph Jefferson (or Jeff) Awards, awarded by a panel of volunteer judges.
Read more about this topic: Theatre In Chicago
Famous quotes containing the word today:
“What we’re saying today is that you’re either part of the solution or you’re part of the problem.”
—Eldridge Cleaver (b. 1935)
“At times it seems that the media have become the mainstream culture in children’s lives. Parents have become the alternative. Americans once expected parents to raise their children in accordance with the dominant cultural messages. Today they are expected to raise their children in opposition to it.”
—Ellen Goodman (20th century)
“To be faced with what so-and-so’s mother lets him do, or what the teacher said in class today or what all the kids are wearing is to be required to reexamine some part of our belief structure. Each time we rethink our values we reaffirm them or begin to change them. Seen in this way, parenthood affords us an exceptional opportunity for growth.”
—Ruth Davidson Bell (20th century)