black theater
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Theater, Film and TV Actor Anthony Chisholm Dead at 77
Theater, film and television actor Anthony Chisholm has died at age 77, The Katz Company, his talent management, announced Friday. Chisholm was born on April 9, 1943, in Cleveland, Ohio and before he was a beloved actor he was a platoon leader for the U.S. Army’s 4th Armored Cavalry, 1st Infantry Division in the Vietnam…
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Gala Goes Virtual: Beyoncé, Solange, Jay-Z, Megan Thee Stallion and More to Appear at WACO Theater Center's Virtual Celebration
Did you miss the stylish spectacle of the Wearable Art Gala this year? Are you quietly a fan of “Ms. Tina’s Corny Jokes”? Want to see how much Blue Ivy’s art allowance increased this year? If you answered yes to any of the above, you’ll want to tune into the WACO Theater Center’s Virtual Celebration…
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Speak on It! Fannie Lou Hamer's Legacy Takes the Chicago Stage With a 9-Venue Outdoor Run—and a Voting Drive
To vote or not to vote this November seems a fairly absurd question to many of us facing what is likely the most crucial election of our lifetimes. But if you’re still on the fence about participating in our (admittedly problematic) electoral process at this point, may I, in all irony, quote the Oompa Loompa-in-Chief…
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Parable of the Songwriter: Toshi Reagon Explains Why an Octavia Butler-Inspired Opera Is More Relevant Than Ever
When Octavia Butler published Parable of Sower in 1993, she fictionally forecasted the year 2024 as a dystopia under immoral and ignorant leadership, wracked by climate change and corporate and political avarice. In Butler’s vision of America, our so-called civilized society buckles under unbearable wealth inequality, a lack of basic resources like clean water and…
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Home Theater: One of the Most Anticipated Plays of the Chicago Theatrical Season Premieres Online
As the COVID-19 epidemic has derailed all of our lives, it has done unimaginable damage to the live entertainment industry, as festival season, concerts and theatrical productions have been unceremoniously postponed or canceled outright, leaving performers, directors, production crews and the venues themselves with gaping holes in their projected incomes. But as they say in…
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Translating Trauma: With a Pair of Powerful Plays, Director Wardell Julius Clark Explores the PTSD of Police Killings
“I like things that subvert the audience’s expectations,” actor/director Wardell Julius Clark told The Root when asked why he gravitates to certain narratives. “We’re going to the theater for a visceral emotional experience; to learn something about ourselves and about humanity.” Clark is at the helm of two very visceral and emotional productions making their…
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Love, Loss, and Living to Tell the Tale: Lindiwe Is a Celebration of Song Wrapped in a Familiar Story
Perhaps the best way to approach a play like Lindiwe, a Love Story is not to ask it to be a play at all—at least, not in the conventional sense. After all, the script was largely written to reunite legendary music group Ladysmith Black Mambazo with the equally famed Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago; a relationship…
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Surviving the Last Supper: The First Deep Breath Is a Family Drama That Hits Home
For every family who revels in reuniting with each other this time of year, there is another for whom the holidays feel more like survival than a celebration—painful truths are choked down with the meal, and more words are eaten than leftovers. Such a family is the Jones clan of Lee Edward Colston II’s The…
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In a New Revival of Oedipus Rex, Ancient Greek Gets a Relevant Refresh
It’s been a year full of revivals in Chicago, and in an era where the Greek chorus has been replaced by the legions on Black Twitter, some might wonder what relevance a revival of Sophocles’ circa-429 B.C. tragedy, Oedipus Rex, holds for contemporary audiences. But as a new production at the University of Chicago-based Court…
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In For Colored Girls’ Revival, There’s a Rising Star in Red Who’s Coming to The Batman
Jayme Lawson is only 22. It’s easy to forget this when watching the recent Juilliard grad strut across the stage with authority in the Public Theater’s new production of poet Ntozake Shange’s legendary 1975 choreopoem, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Was Enuf. The new production, returning to the Public more…