Fire up Netflix -- GILMORE GIRLS: A YEAR IN THE LIFE Is Here Friday!

There have been hints, teasers, sneak peeks and all kinds of interviews to hype Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, the four-part look at where Lorelai and Rory Gilmore are now, eight years after we last saw the mother and daughter living their quirky, rapid-fire, off-beat lives in Stars Hollow, Connecticut.

All the anticipation pays off Friday, November 25, when all four 90-minute episodes drop on Netflix. When and how you watch the four pieces of this Gilmore puzzle are up to you, whether you're the type to binge all at once, watch one a day, or savor and watch five minutes at a time, rewinding to watch again and again, but they'll be there, on Netflix, waiting patiently, when Black Friday hits.

Amy Sherman-Palladino, who provided the original vision behind Gilmore Girls, the series, and her creative partner (and husband) Daniel Palladino are at the helm of Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, which means we can expect the characters to be the people we knew and loved between 2000 and 2007. Or at least 2006. Sherman-Palladino and Palladino weren't there for the 2006-7 season, so... That one is iffy. Anyway, Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel are back as Lorelai and Rory, along with Kelly Bishop as Lorelai's acerbic mother, Emily. Edward Herrmann, the wonderful actor who played Lorelai's patrician father, passed away in 2014, but we are assured Richard Gilmore (and Herrmann) will be well represented as the Gilmores left behind grieve his absence.

Everybody has a different favorite among the friends, acquaintances and annoyances who surrounded the Gilmores. There is a whole lot of quirk in this ensemble. And most of them will be on hand in some capacity. That includes Scott Patterson as Lorelai's faithful love interest Luke, Keiko Agena as Rory's BFF Lane and Melissa McCarthy as Lorelai's pal Sookie, as well as Rose Abdoo (Gypsy), Aris Alvarado (Caesar), Jackson Douglas (Jackson), Chris Eigeman (Jason), Sean Gunn (Kirk), Emily Kuroda (Mrs. Kim), Todd Lowe (Zack), Vanessa Marano (April), Danny Strong (Doyle), Sally Struthers (Babette), David Sutcliffe (Christopher), Liz Torres (Miss Patty), Yanic Truesdale (Michel), Liza Weil (Paris) and Michael Winters (Taylor). Carole King and Sebastian Bach will be making appearances as well. And new faces will also be around, with Broadway stars Christian Borle and Sutton Foster showing up as part of a musical Stars Hollows Thanksgiving pageant.

All three of Rory's major boyfriends -- Dean (Jared Padalecki), Jess (Milo Ventimiglia) and Logan (Matt Czuchry) -- will be back in her life, although nobody knows yet which of them, if any, she ends up with. My guess is that she revisits old loves and sees she's better off alone, but I will have to wait till Friday to find out.

The other big mystery is what exactly the Magic Four Words will be. Amy Sherman-Palladino has said many times that she knew from the get-go how the show would end, and that would be with one four-word line that finishes the story of the Gilmore Girls. Nobody knows what those four words will be, however. A lot of guessers think Rory will tell Lorelai that she is pregnant ("I'm having a baby"?) but that just doesn't sound right to me. Whatever the Magic Four Words are, we'll find out on Friday, along with whether Luke and Lorelai last, how Emily moves on, and what Rory decides about her future.

You'll find Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life on Netflix this Friday.

Time for [TRANS]FORMATION, Presented by Chicago's NWaC and The Living Canvas

Pete Guither, former assistant dean (as well as a photographer, writer, editor, tour guide, teacher, director, musician, mentor, website designer, publications designer, commencement facilitator and general jack-of-all-trades) for the College of Fine Arts at Illinois State University, is keeping busy in his newly retired state. As the artistic director of The Living Canvas, Pete has been working for some time to use elements including projections, lights, movement and unclothed performers to express "the beauty and expressive power of the human form."

This time out, Guither is one of the producers of a newly devised piece called [Trans]formation, presented as a collaboration between The Living Canvas and Chicago's Nothing Without a Company. The other producer is Anna Rose Ii-Epstein, co-artistic director of Nothing Without a Company

[Trans]formation is intended as an exploration of "the naked truth of gender identity." The current production, running through December 17 at the Vault at Collaboraction Studios in the Flat Iron Arts Building in Chicago's Wicker Park neighborhood, serves as its world premiere. It has been "devised entirely from the works of and performed by transgender, genderqueer, intersex, and non-binary artists. Designed and directed in the style of The Living Canvas, nude performers embody the expressive power and diversity of the human form under evocative projections to reveal, instead of conceal, every body’s beautiful possibility."

Director Gaby Labotka, an ISU alum, was also on the team that devised the piece, along with Ronen Kohn, Darling Squire, Avi Roque and Kevin Sparrow. The cast is composed of Kohn and Sparrow as well as Gabriel Faith Howard, Lily Ryan-Lozon, Chase Nuerge and Ben Polson. If you're looking for another ISU connection, you'll find one in sound designer Sarah Putts.

Because of the nature of [Trans]formation and what it's trying to communicate, each performance will include added content both before and after the show. That means there will be a short artistic "portrait" by a local (local to Chicago, presumably) transgender/non-binary artist before the show begins and a discussion afterwards that includes an opportunity for audience members to jump into the "transformation" process on stage if they are so inclined. Those who want to will have the chance to put their own bodies under the projections onstage.

Although [Trans]formation opened in previews last week, there are plenty of performances left to catch. In fact, there is a special Monday night performance tonight to make up for the company taking Thanksgiving Thursday off. After Thanksgiving, they'll resume their regular schedule of performances on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 pm and Sundays at 7 pm. You can get tickets at Brown Paper Tickets and more information at both The Living Canvas and Nothing Without a Company sites.

Joe and Sylvia Penrod Set up ONE FOR THE ROAD This Weekend for Prairie Fire

If you are a fan of musical theater in Bloomington-Normal, you already know you should never, no matter what, pass up an opportunity to hear Joe Penrod sing. His voice is gorgeous plus he's a terrific entertainer and actor who knows how to inhabit lyrics. Sylvia Penrod's talents are different from Joe's, since hers are at the piano, but they're no less impressive. And this weekend, as a holiday gift to all of us, Joe and Sylvia Penrod will be performing together in a revue from Prairie Fire Theatre called One for the Road, scheduled for two shows Saturday and Sunday at Illinois Wesleyan University's Memorial Lounge.

Bloomington Pantagraph reviewer Nancy Steele Brokaw got an advance look at One for the Road and she's listed some of the songs Joe and Sylvia have on their playlist. Her notes include classic pieces like "Come Fly with Me," a 1957 song written by Jimmy Van Heusen and Sammy Cahn for Frank Sinatra and "Try to Remember," written by Harvey Schmidt and Tom Jones* to open The Fantasticks.

There's also material from Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler's Sweeney Todd and Lerner and Loewe's My Fair Lady, both of which Joe Penrod performed recently, and a nod to Leonard Cohen, who passed away on November 7.

Brokaw doesn't mention the song "One for My Baby (and One More for the Road)," although given the event's title, I am guessing it may be on the list. I hope so. It's a beautiful song, with music by Harold Arlen and lyrics by Johnny Mercer, introduced by my favorite, Fred Astaire, in a 1943 movie called The Sky's the Limit, even if it became more associated with Frank Sinatra after Fred had danced and sung his way through it. The song's world-weary "metropolitan melancholy" is unforgettable. "It's quarter to three, there's no one in the place except you and me..." Yeah, we've all been there.

The Penrods will perform One for the Road at 7:30 pm Saturday November 19 and 3 pm Sunday November 20 at the IWU Memorial Lounge. For more information you can visit the Prairie Fire Theatre site or call 309-824-3047 for reservations.

*No, the Tom Jones who wrote the lyrics for The Fantasticks is not that Tom Jones. This one was born in Texas, not Wales, and he also worked with Harvey Schmidt on 110 in the Shade and I Do! I Do!

The Aftermath of the Election

Out in the real world, people continue to eat and sleep and do their jobs as well as they did them before. In my house... We are silent. We can't seem to find words.

William Butler Yeats had words that seem to fit pretty well, however. He wrote this poem in 1919, in the aftermath of World War I.

THE SECOND COMING

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.

The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

                                                     -- William Butler Yeats

New in November!

A sweet Swedish movie called A Man Called Ove, with the quintessential "Get Off My Lawn" cranky neighbor as the main character, comes to the Art Theater Co-op in Champaign tomorrow and Thursday. A  Man Called Ove puts the curmudgeon, a retiree and a widower whose main pursuit in life is enforcing neighborhood regulations, in conflict with a noisy, disorderly family that moves in next boor. Rolf Lassgård stars as Ove; he earned two Best Actor awards, one at the Seattle International Film Festival, for the role. A Man Called Ove will be screened at the Art Theater tomorrow at 6 and 8:30 pm and Thursday, November 3 at 7:30 pm.

Community Players brings out the puppets in November with Avenue Q, the irreverent Broadway musical that mixes Muppet-like characters with adult situations represented in songs like "It Sucks to Be Me" and "The Internet Is for Porn." George W. Bush was president when Avenue Q opened in 2003 and he got a mention in the song "For Now," which celebrates the temporary nature of problems and annoyances. The lyrics to that song have changed since Bush left the presidency in 2009, including a Donald Trump reference earlier this year. No word on whether the Community Players cast will sing about Trump being only "For Now," but we can hope. Brett Cottone directs a cast that includes Aaron Wiessing as Princeton, the puppet who moves to Avenue Q and meets his neighbors, human and puppet alike, and Erin Box as Kate Monster, his love interest. Avenue Q opens at Community Players with a preview performance on November 3, with performances continuing through November 20. For information, click here, or to purchase tickets, click here.

Harold Pinter's The Homecoming, a creepy play from 1964 about a malevolent family and the son (and his wife) who visit, comes to Heartland Theatre beginning November 3. The last time I reviewed The Homecoming, I called it "a surreal domestic dumping ground." That's as good a description as any, I suppose. Since then, I've learned that Pinter thought it was a feminist play, while I fall more on the side of those who think it's really, really misogynistic. If you're a Pinter fan, you'll probably want to decide for yourself if the sole female character, Ruth, represents female power, a combination of the Madonna and the whore, or she's just a "disgusting, distinctively masculine, sexual fantasy." Sandra Zielinski directs a cast that includes guest actor David Kortemeier, who has played many roles for the Illinois Shakespeare Festival and last appeared at Heartland in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof in 1991. After a Pay What You Can Preview on Thursday, November 3, The Homecoming will run till November 19. For showtimes, check this link.

Emergency Prom will give freshman actors at Bradley University a chance to strut their stuff from November 10 to 13 at the Hartmann Center for the Performing Arts. And when I say "strut their stuff," I mean swaying to "Stay" or doing a little Bump N' Grind or whatever else was in fashion with outsiders in 1994. That's the premise of the play -- a group of not-exactly-popular kids in 1994 decide that last weekend's prom was so terrible that they need to stage a do-over, a new prom, an Emergency Prom. Check out the details here.

Arts at ICC presents David Landau's Murder at the Cafe Noir beginning November 11. As you might expect from the title, there are mysterious doings afoot in this play, involving a hard-boiled PI named Rick Archer. If you know your Bogart movies, both pieces of that name will sound familiar. Murder at the Cafe Noir is part Casablanca, part Maltese Falcon, and part Choose Your Own Adventure, with audience interaction to decide what Rick should do. If you're interested in seeing Murder at the Cafe Noir at ICC, pay special attention to the times of performances. Fridays and Saturdays, the curtain is at 6:30 pm, Sundays it's at 2:30 pm, and Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, the show opens at 7:30 pm.

When you think of songwriters Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, something like "My Funny Valentine," "Blue Moon" or "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered" may be the first song that comes to mind. But the Rodgers and Hart score for The Boys from Syracuse is pretty swell, too. This musical version of Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors has "Falling in Love with Love," "This Can't Be Love" and "Sing for Your Supper," songs which were popular at the time and are still popular enough to show up often in revues and concerts. George Abbott directed the first Broadway production in 1938, with Eddie Albert starring as Antipholus of Syracuse. (That's the poster you see at left.) Classic material with a sparkling score is perfect for Illinois Wesleyan University's School of Theatre Arts and its talented students, and also perfect for IWU Associate Professor Scott Susong, who directs the production opening November 15 at the Jerome Mirza Theatre inside MacPherson Hall. Susong's cast includes Conor Finnerty-Esmonde and Tim Foszcz as the two Antipholi, Eli Miller and Kenny Tran as their identical twin servants, both named Dromio, Jackie Salgado as Adriana, who is married to the Antipholus from Ephesus but mistakes his twin bro for her husband, and Yuka Sekine as her sister, Luciana. The Boys from Syracuse will play at IWU for six performances between the 15th and the 20th. For more information or to reserve tickets, contact the School of Theatre Arts box office at 309-556-3232.

Alien Abduction Comedy PEOPLE OF EARTH Tonight on TBS

There's a nice synchronicity in the fact that the new TBS show People of Earth starts tonight, since its plot revolves around people who think they've been abducted by space aliens. There's even a short video teaser for the show that jokes about Halloween and alien costumes.

The premise of People of Earth is pretty easy to summarize, what with Wyatt Cenac playing a journalist who goes to a support group meeting of alien abductees (they prefer to be called "experiencers") ranging from a sheep farmer to a postal worker and their group leader (played by the always welcome Ana Gasteyer) who got the space at the church where the Starcrossers group meets. Cenac's Ozzie Graham is our entry into this world and he is sympathetic and skeptical enough to pull us right in. Well, he's skeptical at the start, anyway. His descent into "experiencer" is part of the fun.

People of Earth is definitely off-kilter and amusing, especially when the plot takes twists you don't necessarily expect, like the fact that the people in the group are not just delusional weirdos. When we learn, about halfway into the pilot, that the aliens are real, things get even funnier, but in a sweet, loopy way that is very appealing. It's nice to take a pass on gross-out humor for once. This humor is character-based, even alien-character-based.

Make no mistake: The aliens are a big part of the humor. There's a small gray one with a big head, a green, reptilian one, and a taller, blond, Nordic type with great hair. That last alien looked to me like Legolas, even though the people in the show described him as a Ryan Gosling type or a young Paul Newman. Come on! He's totally Legolas with a slight Swedish accent. I would accept Alexander Skarsgård, given the accent, but nobody mentioned him, either.

But the important thing is not what they look like or sound like, just that they are hilarious in a sly sort of way as they bicker amongst themselves and take potshots at how stupid humans are. I can't wait to see more of them find out what their mission is and what they want with the specific people in the Starcrossers.

The pilot episode has been available on Youtube for a week, but its first outing on TBS will be tonight at 9 pm Eastern/8 Central, followed by a second episode titled "Sponsored By."  Beam me up, Legolas Skarsgård!

What's Coming Up at Illinois Shakes in 2017

The Illinois Shakespeare Festival has announced plans for its 40th anniversary season, taking place next summer at Ewing Cultural Center in Bloomington. The 2017 summer season will include one bona fide Shakespeare play and two adaptations.

The real-live Shakespeare play will be A Midsummer Night's Dream, always a popular choice. This magical comedy, full of fairies, foolish mortals in love and an amateur acting troupe trying to put on a terrible play, will open the season on June 30, playing till August 11.

An image from the 2009 Midsummer directed by Deb Alley. Photo by Pete Guither.

A Midsummer Night's Dream was first done at the Illinois Shakespeare Festival in 1980 and has been well represented here ever since. I have good memories of the hilarious 2002 production directed by Karen Kessler, where Puck looked like a tiny pony, as well as the sultry 2009 Cajun-flavored Midsummer directed by Deb Alley. What will set the next Midsummer apart? Illinois Shakes says:  "Our family-friendly production of Shakespeare's world-famous comedy follows four young lovers into an enchanted forest for an unforgettable journey of trickery, laughter, and love. Featured in this production is a musical Puck, whose original score is sure to cast a spell on you!"

The Illinois Shakespeare Festival has a tendency to offer one comedy, one drama and one "other." This time, there are two contenders for that "other" spot, with Chris Coleman's Shakespeare's Amazing Cymbeline the first. Coleman is the artistic director at Portland Center Stage in Oregon, and his six-actor adaptation of Cymbeline, produced at PCS in 2012, represented the first time Shakespeare was performed by that theater. The image below is from that production.

In Coleman's take on Cymbeline, one of those six performers, a musician, serves as the narrator to keep all of Cymbeline's wandering plot threads together. The important thing to note is that Cymbeline, the King of Britain, isn't that important a character even if he does get the title. It's Imogen, his daughter, whose story you'll need to follow. Dad's evil wife wants to marry Imogen off to her cloddish son, but Imogen is already secretly married to a guy named Posthumus. Because of the marriage, Posthumus is banished, whereafter he makes a stupid bet concerning his wife, is fooled by a bad friend (bed trick alert!) into thinking she's unfaithful, and decides to kill her. But our Imogen is no dummy and she dresses as a boy (cross-dressing girl alert!) and goes on the lam, where she accidentally runs into her brothers, who were kidnapped when they were little. And the clod (his name is Cloten) is on her trail, too. By the time it all gets sorted out, there is a headless body dressed in someone else's clothes (mistaken identity alert!) and an appearance by the god Jupiter to promise everything will turn out OK.

By my count, Cymbeline has only been done twice by the Illinois Shakespeare Festival, making it a rare choice. If you need to check Cymbeline off your bucket Shakespeare list, this is the time, even in its reduced, six-person state. It will be performed between July 1 and August 12, 2017 in the outdoor theater at Ewing.

The last play on the schedule is also an adaptation. The Q Brothers made an appearance in Bloomington in 2015 to offer Q Gents, a hip-hop version of The Two Gentlemen of Verona performed by four actors from the Q Brothers Collective. This time they're performing something called I Heart Juliet, a hip-hop (and comedic) riff on Romeo and Juliet, performed with a cast of ten. We are told: "The Q Brothers Collective is at it again, bringing their incredible energy, humor, and hip-hop verse to Shakespeare’s timeless masterpiece, Romeo and Juliet!" Note that I Heart Juliet will be performed inside, in Illinois State University's Westhoff Theatre, from July 9 to August 8. (The I Heart Juliet image above is from a Connecticut college production.)

Tickets to all three of these Illinois Shakespeare Festival offerings will go on sale later in 2016. Keep an eye on the Illinois Shakes website and Facebook page for details.