About Face Theatre Company has completed casting for its spring production of Take Me Out, the controversial play about a gay Major League Baseball slugger that includes a nude lockerroom scene. The entire cast had not been announced at press time, but Jonny knows that tall, athletic About Face co-founder Kyle Hall will return to Chicago in a principal role, the shortstop, Tippy, and that Tom Aulino will play the star's gay business manager, Mason, the role for which former Chicagoan Denis O'Hare won a 2003 Tony Award. Aulino previously worked with About Face in Theatre District. Eric Rosen will direct Take Me Out, which plays the Steppenwolf Upstairs Theatre March 24-May 1 (but expect an extension).
Long before Take Me Out, About Face will return to Steppenwolf to join forces once again with director Moises Kaufman and his New York-based Tectonic Theatre Project. When these artists teamed up last spring, the result was the double Tony Award-winning play, I Am My Own Wife. The project this time, publicized as quite erotic, is One Arm, a stage adaptation of a never-filmed Tennessee Williams screenplay. Set in the steamy south (New Orleans and the Florida Keys), One Arm is about a boxer who turns to hustling when he loses an arm in an auto accident. The run is short, Dec. 2-19 only, so you might want to book tickets in advance.
Who was that short, extremely muscular, slightly middle-aged man at Sidetracks for Showtune Night last week? Could it have been Tony Award-winning Broadway composer Stephen Schwartz (Godspell, Pippin, Wicked)? Could he have been in Chicago to announce that Wicked will be at the Ford Center/Oriental Theatre next April 29-June 12 to launch the show's national tour? Could it be that Jonny first met Stephen 28 long years ago, when Schwartz was developing Working at the Goodman Theatre? Could it be that Jonny and Stephen both were only 12 years old at the time?
Diva watch: two great Chicago divas who've gone on to national acclaim will be returning home very much in the spotlight. Evergreen star Karen Mason will be at the Metropolis Centre in Arlington Heights (her home town), Nov. 19-20, performing an intimate set of her favorite Broadway and cabaret songs. Karen won the 2004 MAC Award—the big award in the cabaret field—for Major Female Vocalist. Not too long ago, Mason toured in Mamma Mia, but now she's yielded her spot to another great Chicago talent, E. Faye Butler. When Mamma Mia comes back—yes, again—to the Ford Center/Oriental Theatre, Nov. 23-Dec. 26, E. Faye will be co-starring as Rosie.
On Nov. 15, Chicago Shakespeare Theatre will honor one of our own, and one of Chicago's leading actors, Greg Vinkler. Winner of two Jeff Awards and two After Dark Awards, Vinkler has appeared in 25 productions at Chicago Shakespeare in 18 years, more than any other performer. Among his many roles large and small, he's played King John (twice), King Lear, Polonious and Malvolio. The lean Vinkler has played fat Sir John Falstaff in all three plays in which Falstaff appears, including the current production of The Merry Wives of Windsor (through Nov. 21).
During the summer months, Vinkler and his longtime partner, Todd Schmidt, operate the Peninsula Players in Door County, Wisc., one of the oldest summer stock theaters in the nation.
Away from the bright lights of Chicago, Vinkler directs and acts in Neil Simon and British sex farces. Well, you can't wax Shakespearean all the time!
