Far Away
Playwright: Caryl Churchill. At: winterfall chicago at The Charnel House, 3421 W. Fullerton Ave. Contact: 800-838-3006; $12. Runs through: Dec. 11
LIT!
Playwrights: The Ensemble. At: GayCo Productions at Annoyance Theatre, 4830 N. Broadway St. Phone: 773-561-4665; $15. Runs through: Dec. 30
For many people, Caryl Churchill's 2000 drama Far Away will be far too slight and oblique to enjoy. Consisting of just three short scenes, Far Away requires audiences to fill in the blanks to the sinister world Churchill dreams up, where paranoia reigns and not even animals or the environment can be trusted.
At the very least, the new company winterfall chicago has concocted a sturdy environmental production and pre-show multimedia exhibit to prod you to think about the themes of governmental oppression and rebellion dealt with in Churchill's Far Away. Director Nate Silver's decision to use The Charnel House in Logan Square adds plenty of character to the proceedings, with scenes taking place in the venue's main hall and in the lobby.
The performances are good, but you get the sense that the actors Elizabeth Dowling, Baize Buzan and Bernard Balbot are still wrapping their heads around the issues Churchill concocts. So the characters aren't self-assuredly defined by the actors as they could be.
As for the company of GayCo Productions' 15th-anniversary holiday show, LIT!, the members are most assuredly funny, if not the greatest of singers. While this isn't a debilitating drawback, it does show an area where this long-running LGBT comedy troupe could improve.
Some of the song sketches are also not as clever as they could be. The opening song pitting conservative Tea Partiers versus the 99 percent in the Occupy movement seems constricted by the song lyrics, while a song showing an overweight man getting exciting about spending Christmas at the bathhouse Man's Country has a very odd and questionable tone.
However, other that these few clunkers, the rest of LIT! is thoroughly funny throughout. There are even a couple of scenes that incisively touch upon lesbian parenting that will not only make you laugh, but tug at the heartstrings.
LIT! director Piero Procaccini and musical director Amanda Murphy keep things moving along speedily with several standout characterizations from the cast.
John Loos and Brett Mannes are very amusing as two Freudian-slipping husbands who are attracted to each other but lumbered with crass and drunken wives, while Kelly Beeman makes for a hilarious left-behind ornament (complete with rotund red costume).
Kathy Betts and Judy Fabjance are great in a sketch where a mother and her lesbian daughter challenge stereotypes about each other, while Clay Goodpasture is consistently funny as multiple characters ranging from a modern-day Tiny Tim in music class to a back-biting suburban sister lunching at the Walnut Room in Macy's on State Street.
With LIT!, GayCo provides a funnily skewed and thoughtful LGBT reflection on the holiday season. Although it's not perfect, LIT! has enough winners to make it all worthwhile.