U of I's Amanda Drinkall Set for VENUS IN FUR at the Goodman

Amanda Drinkall

The Goodman Theatre has announced casting for its upcoming production of David Ives' Venus in Fur, and the tricky, complex, sexy role of Vanda, the Venus in question, will be played by Amanda Drinkall, a University of Illinois alum just starting to break out in Chicago theatrical circles.

Since her time as an undergrad in Champaign-Urbana, Drinkall has performed as Juliet in Romeo and Juliet with the Michigan Shakespeare Festival and Ursula in Much Ado About Nothing at the North Carolina Shakespeare Festival, as well as performing in Chicago with the Goodman (Measure for Measure), Strawdog Theatre (Great Expectations), Lifeline Theatre (Pride and Prejudice), Victory Gardens (Failure: A Love Story) and The Back Room Shakespeare Project (Othello, Romeo and Juliet, A Winter’s Tale, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream). As part of the ensemble at Red Tape Theatre, she has appeared in Young Jun Lee's Lear and Pullman, WA, The Skriker, Brand, The Love of the Nightingale, and The Making of a Modern Folk Hero. And she is listed as part of the cast for hamlet is dead. no gravity at Red Tape, opening January 27.

Drinkall's take on chilly Estella and sweet Biddy in Strawdog's Great Expectations earned her a spot on Chicago Tribune critic Chris Jones' list of the best acting performances of 2013.

Venus in Fur is an interesting choice for the Goodman, given its focus on an erotic cat-and-mouse game between a director and the actress who wants a role in his play. Ives' play (and the play within the play) take their cues from Leopold von Sacher-Masoch's Venus in Furs, an 1870 century novel that depicted the kinky power dynamic between a siren named Wanda and the man who wants to be her sex slave. Sacher-Masoch gave his name to the word "masochism," by the way.

Ives' funny, modern, still kinky spin on Venus started off-Broadway in 2010, moving to the Lyceum Theater on Broadway in 2011. The play was nominated for the Best Play Tony and it won Best Actress for Nina Arianda, who played Vanda opposite Hugh Dancy's Thomas, the playwright.

For the Goodman, director Joanie Schultz will take the reins, with Drinkall and Rufus Collins, an actor with extensive Broadway and off-Broadway credits, as Thomas.

Venus in Fur is set to open March 8 in the Goodman's Albert Theatre, the 856-seat main stage, with performances through April 13, 2014.

Starry Dramatists Guild Panel Chats on Adaptation and Translation

The Dramatists Guild has been having its annual conference in Chicago this week, with all kinds of nifty panels and discussions devoted to the business and creative aspects of playwriting, composing, and creating librettos and lyrics. On Thursday, Douglas Post, the playwright behind Heartland Theatre's next production, Earth and Sky, introduced keynote speaker Martha Lavey, Steppenwolf's Artistic Director, and that was followed by sessions with notable people like Lin-Manuel Miranda, Theresa Rebeck and Jeffrey Sweet.

One of the most interesting panels involved adaptation and/or translation, or working with someone else's material from another medium or language to create something for the stage. The panelists were Carol Hall, composer and lyricist for The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas and lyricist for A Christmas Memory, a musical adaptation of a Truman Capote story; Winnie Holzman, who adapted Gregory Maguire's novel into the megamusical Wicked; David Ives, the playwright behind All in the Timing as well recent adaptations like The Liar, The School for Lies and Is He Dead? and the book doctor (surgeon?) for 33 different Encores! musicals; and Doug Wright, who wrote the play I Am My Own Wife and the books for musicals as disparate as Grey Gardens, The Little Mermaid and Hands on a Hardbody. That's quite a panel!

Luckily for those of us not in attendance at the Dramatists Guild conference, Broadway World is sharing the wealth by offering video of that panel that anyone can look at. Click here to see and hear the wit and wisdom of Hall, Holzman, Ives and Wright. It's jam-packed with good information (like the fact that it's better to adapt the work of someone who is dead, and maybe easier if you don't like the source material all that much) as well as a glimpse into the personalities of some different people who've all managed to make adaptations work.

And if, like me, you are now bound and determined to get to next year's conference, you can see information on joining the Dramatists Guild here.

Goodman Theatre Announces 2013-14 Slate of Performances

Chicago's Goodman Theatre has announced its 2013-14 "Dream Season," with an emphasis on women directors and playwrights. The Goodman is billing this season as "Eight exquisite productions that offer you a magical, unparalleled theater experience."

Three of the five shows slated for the Albert Theatre space were created by women, from Cheryl L. West's Pullman Porter Blues to Rebecca Gilman's Luna Gale and Mary Zimmerman's The White Snake.

West is a University of Illinois alum whose early work premiered in Champaign-Urbana. Her play Jar the Floor was one of the first things I reviewed for the Champaign News-Gazette back in 1989. It was fabulous. Pullman Porter Blues premiered last year at the Seattle Repertory Theatre, where it was described as a "captivating coming of age story...woven with iconic blues music." Chuck Smith, who is celebrating twenty years of working with the Goodman Theatre, will direct Pullman Porter Blues, which is scheduled to begin September 18, 2013 in the Albert.

Next up is Gilman's Luna Gale, which opens January 18, 2014 and will be directed by Goodman Artistic Director Robert Falls. Gilman is probably best known for The Glory of Living, Boy Gets Girl and Spinning Into Butter, all three of which received the Joseph Jefferson Award for Best New Play. Gilman is a multi-award winning playwright as well as an artistic associate at the Goodman. Her new work, Luna Gale, looks at a social worker who places a baby with the mother of a teen couple with addiction problems and how that decision spirals into terrible choices and possibly terrifying consequences.

Also in the Albert, David Ives' Broadway hit Venus in Fur starts March 8, 2014, in a production directed by Joanie Schultz. Ives plays off Leopold von Sacher-Masoch's "Venus in Furs," an 1870 novella about a man who fantasizes about being the sexual slave of the woman he desires. In Ives' updated version, we see a director confronted with (and fascinated by) a strange young actress who arrives to audition for him. Because it's David Ives, you know it's funny, but Venus in Fur also becomes dark and a little dangerous as the director and actress play cat and mouse with dominance and submission.

Mary Zimmerman's The White Snake, another in a series of Zimmerman's dazzling visual adaptations of classic stories, spins off from a Chinese fable about a snake who takes on human form and falls in love. Our snake heroine wants nothing more than to stay a woman forever, but her true reptile identity is discovered, threatening her happy human life. This "ravishing theatrical spectacle" opens May 3, 2014, with Zimmerman once again at the helm of her unique, amazing work.

Lerner and Loewe's Brigadoon, a musical fairytale about a Scottish town that appears for one day and then disappears for a hundred years, will close out the Albert season with performances from June 27 to August 3, 2014. The original 1947 Broadway production starred David Brooks as Tommy, the 20th century hero who stumbles onto Brigadoon, while the movie version in 1954 put Gene Kelly in the role. Brigadoon was revived for a one-night concert version in 2010 starring Jason Danieley, who just appeared at Chicago Shakes as George in Sunday in the Park with George, and Melissa Errico as the lovers separated by the vanishing village. Can we hope to get Danieley back for the Goodman's Brigadoon? I have no idea, but a girl can dream. Rachel Rockwell will direct.

The more intimate Owen Theatre will host Noah Haidle's Smokefall, a poetic exploration of family love and loss directed by Anne Kaufman, set to open October 5; Buzzer, a provocative and funny new piece about race and romance from Tracey Scott Wilson, author of The Good Negro, to be directed by Jessica Thebus in performances beginning February 8, 2014; and Ask Aunt Susan, Seth Bockley's comic take on a man who gets sucked into pretending to be a female self-help guru on the internet. Deception, deception, deception... Ask Aunt Susan is scheduled for May, 2014, with Henry Wishcamper directing.

For information about all of these shows as well as subscriptions and tickets, you can visit the Goodman Theatre site here. It's worth it just for the beautiful images they've chosen to represent this dreamy season!

Art, Lies and Kings: Chicago Shakespeare Theatre in 2012-13

Chicago Shakespeare Theater has announced their plans for their 2012-12 subscription season as well as a couple of extras to keep you entertained all the way through to June 16, 2013.

Chicago Shakes offers 4-play and 3-play subscription packages, with the Sondheim/Lapine musical "Sunday in the Park with George," directed by Gary Griffin, scheduled for September 26 to November 4; "The School for Lies," the David Ives adaptation of Moliere's Misanthrope, directed by Chicago Shakes Artistic Director Barbara Gaines, from December 4 to January 20; Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar," directed by Jonathan Munby, from February 5 to March 24, thereby including the Ides of March; and the seldom-produced "Henry VIII," also directed by Barbara Gaines, from April 30 to June 16.

"Sunday in the Park" is Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine's Pulitzer-Prize-winning look at French Post-Impressionist painter George Seurat and his pointillist painting, "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte," which hangs in the Art Institute of Chicago. It also looks at his fictional mistress and great-grandson and some of the character represented in the painting, as it ponders questions of art, creativity and how community and connections affect them. Griffin directed an earlier (and much-lauded) production of the show in the smaller theater upstairs, but this one will be in the main Courtyard Theatre.

"The School for Lies" appeared Off-Broadway at the Classic Stage Company in 2011, still set in France, still using period costumes, but with a guy named Frank instead of Moliere's original misanthrope and snappy swipes at people who say LOL or wear flip flops. Ives goes big and bawdy with his rhyming couplets, taking aim at the follies of mankind just as Moliere did.

You still have a few chances to see "Julius Caesar" at Illinois State University if you want to contrast and compare with the Chicago Shakes production next winter. Shakespeare's story of political ambition, loyalty, power and conspiracies never goes out of style.

Shakespeare's "Henry VIII" is usually a dryer affair, but let's give credit to Chicago Shakes for taking on some of the lesser-known plays in the canon. (See "Timon of Athens," coming up in April.) "Henry VIII" is all about Henry's marital problems and the religious and political storms that creates, as he tosses out Katherine of Aragon, takes up with Anne Boleyn, and battles the double-dealing Cardinal Wolsey over matters of finance and power. With Barbara Gaines at the helm, this "Henry" may turn out as brash and bold as the old king himself.

The first of the scheduled extras comes from the National Theatre of Scotland, who'll be bringing "The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart," created by David Greig and directed by Wils Wilson, to the theater Upstairs at Chicago Shakespeare. "Prudence," which involves a prim academic on a voyage of self-discovery, is described as "a Faustian tale" as well as a "music-filled romp of rhyming couplets and wild karaoke."

The National Theatre of Scotland is also behind "Black Watch," which will be presented off-site at the Chicago Park District's Broadway Armory. This is a return visit for "Black Watch," which combines Scottish folk music and military anthems (and lots of bagpipes) to tell its story of a Scotsmen fighting in Iraq. Playwright Gregory Burke conducted interviews with soldiers back from Iraq to get the real story of what it means to fight and whether it's ever possible to come back home. If you click here, you can see an interview with Burke, director John Tiffany, and associate directors Steven Hoggett, who was in charge of movement, and Davey Anderson, who handled the music. "Black Watch" will be presented in a limited engagement October 10 to 21, 2012.

For information on all of those shows, subscriptions, or tickets to Simon Callow's "Being Shakespeare," "Timon of Athens," or "The History of Everything," still to be performed this season, you can visit the Chicago Shakes site here.

Happy Birthday, Stephen Sondheim!

There were a whole lot of special celebrations and tributes planned for Stephen Sondheim's 80th birthday in 2010, continuing on through at least March 9, 2012, when Sondheim was given the UK Critics' Circle 2011 Award for Distinguished Services to the Arts.

Whether they were specifically intended to honor Sondheim's 80th, 81st or 82nd birthdays or it's just a general sense of celebration, we've seen "Sondheim: the Birthday Concert" at the New York Philharmonic, telecast on PBS and available on DVD; the musical "Sondheim on Sondheim," with a cast album available at PS Classics; "Sondheim 80," a concert at the Roundabout; another celebration at New York City Center; a British birthday concert during the BBC Proms; the New York Pops offering yet another tribute concert at Carnegie Hall; the publication of "Finishing the Hat" and "Look, I Made a Hat," two volumes written by the man himself discussing his lyrics and his general philosophy on songwriting; a New York Philharmonic concert version of "Company" that was filmed and screened all over the US; a "Follies" on Broadway (cast recording also available at PS Classics) and another one in Chicago; an outdoors "Into the Woods" built into a tree in Regent's Park; a City Center Encores! version of "Merrily We Roll Along," and, of course, lots and lots and lots of productions of other Sondheim shows all over the place.

I'm totally in favor of keeping this party going if it means I keep getting concerts and shows and cast recordings and book and posters to entertain me. I'm also willing to adopt Sondheim's birthday as my own if it will match up better to when Sondheim stuff is made available and I have gift list privileges.

In any event, if you haven't brought your own collection up to date, you have time to do that. But don't wait too long. Because (and I realize I have totally buried the lead here) The Guardian in England has announced that Sondheim is working on a new show. No, I'm not kidding. His last show was Wise Guys/Bounce/Road Show, which went through many different versions, casts and plot byways, never did quite gel as far as most critics are concerned, and is discussed at length in "Look, I Made a Hat." But this new show... The Guardian reports that Sondheim said he had 20 to 30 minutes of material written and that he is working with playwright David Ives ("All in the Timing," "Venus in Fur") on the book. And here's the really intriguing quote: "It's an idea I've had for a long time and it springs indirectly from a moment in a play of David's." Trotsky with a hatchet embedded in his head? Spinoza on trial? A cross-dressing painter or businessman?

We'll have to wait and see, but it's certainly intriguing. And I hope he has more than half an hour of material by now.