Much has been made recently about Chicago theatrical talent triumphantly transferring to New York. But Chicago theater veterans are also active on the other coast, in Los Angeles.
Broadway first: Chicago playwrights Tracy Letts and Keith Huff are respectively represented on Broadway now with Superior Donuts ( with the original 2008 Steppenwolf cast ) and the two-character Chicago cop drama A Steady Rain ( famously featuring Hollywood hunks Daniel Craig and Hugh Jackman ) .
Chicago-based director David Cromer is also busy in Gotham. Cromer's acclaimed Hypocrites transfer of Our Town continues off-Broadway while he stages Broadway repertory productions of Neil Simon's Brighton Beach Memoirs and Broadway Bound. Both star Emmy Award-winning Steppenwolf ensemble member Laurie Metcalf.
News also recently broke that Cromer is slated to direct a revival of Picnic next season on Broadway. ( His 2008 Writers' Theatre production of the William Inge drama in Glencoe garnered national media praise. )
But I was pleased to find numerous Chicago theater connections last month when I saw two works by out playwrights on a weekend trip to Los Angeles. Odyssey Theatre Ensemble and Evidence Room Theatre Company's West Coast premiere of Adam Bock's The Receptionist ( now through Nov. 21 ) and the West Hollywood, Calif.-based Celebration Theatre's American premiere of Joe DiPietro's Fucking Men ( now through Nov. 1 ) both featured former Windy City talent.
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No doubt the main reason audiences are flocking to The Receptionist is the actress in the title role: Megan Mullally. Before she skyrocketed to fame as the campy and glamorous rich-bitch secretary Karen Walker on the NBC-TV sitcom Will and Grace, Mullally famously cut her theatrical teeth as a Chicago actor.
But to my surprise, I found another prominent Chicago theater alum appearing in The Receptionist: Steppenwolf co-founder Jeff Perry playing the boss Edward Raymond.
I must say that I was most impressed by their performances, particularly Mullally as she played against her sitcom persona to realistically portray Beverly Wilkins, a homespun receptionist found in any office block. Mullally's every small vocal tic of disapproval or squeak of a chair was timed perfectly for best comic effect.
Mullally's banter with her co-stars Jennifer Finnigan ( as man-crazy co-worker Lorraine Taylor ) and Chris L. McKenna ( as the initially friendly visitor Martin Dart ) was also spot on.
It's too bad that Bock's 70-minute play was so slight and ham-fisted with its message. The Receptionist was clearly created as a criticism of the torture policies under the administration of former President George W. Bush. ( By the way, About Face Theatre is locally presenting the world premiere of Bock's Flowers in Chicago. )
By showing the mundane details of office life in The Receptionist, Bock shows how many Americans became desensitized to news about government-sanctioned torture. But you really wish that Bock found another way of artistically approaching the topic without so blatantly spelling it out.
La Ronde-Gay
With a title like Fucking Men, the subject matter of Joe DiPietro's drama is explicitly spelled out. And as expected with most plays catering to gay audiences, the prerequisite for male nudity is most definitely met ( and then some ) .
One of those guys revealing all for the first time on stage is former Chicagoan Jeffrey Patrick Olson. Before he left Chicago last May to try and make it as an L.A. actor/model/anesthesiologist ( honestly, that's what's on his business card! ) , Olson's Windy City credits included MidTangent Productions' initial run of Snow White and the Seven Drag Queens and Hell in a Handbag Productions' Die! Mommy! Die! ( Full disclosure: I've also performed with Olson in the Chicago Gay Men's Chorus' Sidetrack V in 2007. )
But as Olson pointed out, the show had other Chicago connections with cast members like Gregory Franklin ( a former Chicago actor most recently seen in Bailiwick's The Hunchback of Notre Dame ) to former Chicagoan Michael A. Shepperd who is now Celebration Theatre's artistic director and producer.
Fucking Men is clearly a show that would have thrived at the former Bailiwick space. Not only was there the massive amount of male nudity, but DiPietro's modern gay updating of Arthur Schitzler's La Ronde would have jibed with Bailiwick's gay-friendly producing.
Just like Schitzler's heterosexual original, Fucking Men follows 10 men in 10 circular scenes of sexual encounters to comment on American gay sexual mores today. True, the characterizations are mostly one-dimensional and the adaptation itself isn't as creatively developed as Michael John LaChuisa's Hello Again, a 1994 musical take on La Ronde. But Fucking Men serves its purpose of providing gay men simultaneous titillation and some gay relationship and political issues for thought.
Celebration Theatre's production under director/producer Calvin Remsberg was strongly cast with not only skilled actors, but jaw-droppingly handsome ones as well. Particularly of note was AJ Tannen as the neurotic Jewish playwright Sammy, David Pevsner as the deceptive Wall Street executive Jack and Sean Galuszka as his emotionally conflicted husband, Leo, navigating the boundaries of an "open relationship."
So while Chicago theater talent making good in New York gets lots of attention, I'm glad to shine a quick spotlight on a few former Chicagoans working in Los Angeles. They may all be away from the Windy City for now, but Chicagoans can always boast about we helped to nurture their artistic talents first.
Please send theater-related news and other tidbits to scottishplayscott@yahoo.com and Andrew@windycitymediagroup.com .
