"Djukic’s mesmerizing production, however, succeeds in every needed way ... From its use of Peter Tegel’s poetic translation, to Brandon Wardell’s gorgeously dilapidated set and Keith Parham’s precise lighting, to the interpolation of new Weill-worthy cabaret settings by composer Josh Schmidt (Adding Machine, A Minister’s Wife) accompanied by a multitalented cast, Djukic’s choices unify and elevate the material. Perhaps most vital is Ian Westerfer’s presence in the title role. "
Baal - Highly Recommended
Kris Vire , TimeOut Chicago
http://chicago.timeout.com/articles/theater/85971/baal-at-tuta-theatre-chicago-theater-review
Critic's Choice - "With the help of a first-rate cast, Keith Parham's expressionistic lighting, and Josh Schmidt's fine folk-rock settings ofBrecht poems, TUTA Theatre artistic director Zeljko Djukic creates a vivid, dreamlike work of stage poetry"
Baal - Critic's Choice Chicago Reader
Bill Williams , Chicago Reader
http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/Event?oid=2002612
"And then there was that “Our Town” in the basement of the Chopin Theatre. Cromer’s production for The Hypocrites (the off-Broadway transfer is still playing) was so extraordinary I’m placing it on my lifetime top-10 Chicago shows.."
From 'Shadow' to Broadway invitations, director David Cromer is at his tipping point
Chris Jones , Chicago Tribune
http://leisureblogs.chicagotribune.com/the_theater_loop/2010/05/from-shadow-to-working-on-broadway-director-david-cromer-is-at-h
"But if you’ve never seen “Aunt Dan,” and you prefer some intellectual bang for your theatergoing buck, you’ll surely be compelled..
'Aunt Dan and Lemon' by Backstage Theatre: Beware childhood influences
Chris Jones , Chicago Tribune
Highly Recommended - “In dim, claustrophobic quarters in the Chopin basement..Maher builds a fascinating 80-minute monologue...Did we mention the play’s hilarious?"
Dr. Faustus
Christopher Shea , TimeOut Chicago
Critic’s Choice - “As one of the guitarists in Bardo Pond, Michael Gibbons helps make some of the heaviest psychedelic rock going.
Empty Bottle Presents: 500mg
Billy Meyer , Chicago Reader
Highly Recommended - "The two hours Djukic and company spend submerging the script's titanic passions set up an explosive, debilitating, pathetic finale”.
Uncle Vanya
Justin Hayford , Chicago Reader
Critic's Choice - " The way Cabic’s sweet croon floats his bucolic melodies...is classic folk rock.
Empty Bottle Presents: Vetiver
Miles Raymer , Chicago Reader
"Theater devotees know the swoon—that rapturous transport when every element of a production coalesces...
Best Local Production of 2008
Justin Hayford , Chicago Reader
"The theme of last night’s installment of The Encyclopedia Show was “explosives,” a tie-in to Young Chicago Authors’s Louder Than a Bomb poetry competition. So who better to serve as the unannounced special guest than Bill Ayers?
Bill Ayers talks explosives at The Encyclopedia Show
Kris Vire , TimeOut Chicago
#2. Our Town by the Hypocrites at Chopin Theatre - " The actor-director David Cromer turned what we thought would be an ordinary little basement production of the high school favorite into a rivetingly revisionist and devastatingly unsentimental indictment of small-town denial. It’s headed to New York in 2009".
Top 10 of 2008: Our Town
Chris Jones , Chicago Tribune
#4. Uncle Vanya by Tuta Theater at Chopin Theatre - " Was melancholy ever this pleasurable?"..
Ten Most Wanted 2008: Uncle Vanya
Christopher Piatt , TimeOut Chicago
#2. Our Town by the Hypocrites at Chopin Theatre - "Skeptics rolled their eyes when this project was announced; by the curtain call of the Hypocrites’ urban, rigorously unsentimental Our Town, few of those eyes were still dry"...
Ten Most Wanted 2008: Our Town
Christopher Piatt , TimeOut Chicago
#5. Miss Julie by the Hypocrites at Chopin Theatre - "Fringe-theater proprietor Sean Graney had a big year, including well-received projects at some of the city’s largest theaters. But Graney’s promenade Hypocrites staging of Miss Julie—Strindberg’s iconoclastic play.. was the director’s most confident and slyly class-conscious work to date.
Ten Most Wanted 2008: Miss Julie
Christopher Piatt , TimeOut Chicago
Critic's Choice - Eastern Europeans seem to have an advantage over native English speakers when it comes to directing Shakespeare. I've seen loads of wonderful productions by Americans, Brits, and so on, but two of my three all-time favorites were created by artists from the former Soviet bloc. And now, with Zeljko Djukich's TUTA Theatre staging of The Most Excellent and Lamentable Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet, it's three of four.
Romeo & Juliet
Tony Adler , Chicago Reader
"Is David Cromer the most talented theater director that Americans have never heard of?
...By night he was playing the Stage Manager in his freshly reimaginged production of "Our Town", a smash hit for the Hypocrites theater troupe last season, which returned for an encore run this Fall at the enchantingly funky Chopin Theatre in the Wicker Park neighborhood".
Prolific Director, Off Off Off Off Broadway
Charles Isherwood , New York Times
BEST BETS
"See tales about forging identity in a changing world at the fourth annual I-Fest European Solo Acts.
I-Fest 2008
Julia Borchets , Chicago Tribune's Red Eye
Best Bets - "See tales about forging identity in a changing world at the fourth annual I-Fest European Solo Acts.
Best Bets: I-Fest 2008
Julia Borchets , Chicago Tribune
"..Mini UN of experimental theater"
I-Fest 2008
Kerry Reid , Performink
“If you look at the non-musical Chicago shows with a lot of buzz so far this fall: “Picnic” at Writers Theatre, “Our Town” by The Hypocrites, “Edward II” at Chicago Shakespeare, and the Griffin Theatre’s “On the Shore of the Wide World,” you’ll see they’re the work of three provocative, auteur-style Chicago directors whose careers are most assuredly on the rise.
Cromer, Graney, Berry: Fall is a tale of 3 hot directors
Chris Jones , Chicago Tribune
"..the lavishly decorated bohemian basement of the Chopin Theatre doubles as a bar in "Gray in White and Black," an existential drama that recently wrapped production in Chicago" - Robert K. Elder, Chicago Tribune 9/5/08
Chopin Theatre the set for an existential tavern
Robert K. Elder , Chicago Tribune
www.grayblackwhitefilm.com
“TUTA delivers the goods—it’s that simple. The low-profile, Off-Loop theater company picks meaty plays, strips them to their barest elements, casts them with great actors, admits a paying audience and then stands back to let it all unfold".
TUTA gives an old love story a youthful shot in the arm
Christopher Piatt , TimeOut Chicago
"Zmuda is, in fact, a gifted improviser, albeit a terrifying one without any semblance of aesthetic boundary. It isn't so much the profane material here that gets under your skin - although it does, it does. It's Zmuda's total assumption of character—it feels even an invasion of armed buffalo wouldn't snap him back to reality" - Chris Jones, Chicago Tribune
Tossed cigarettes and bad Sinatra —then 'Clifton' really gets weird
Chris Jones , Chicago Tribune
Oddly enough, a different production of "Our Town" was recently the hottest ticket in Chicago. That production, from a company called the Hypocrites, was directed by Cromer, who received the Off Broadway Lucille Lortel Award for helming tuner "Adding Machine," another Chicago-initiated project that became an unlikely New York hit.
N.Y. spotlight shines on Chicago
Steve Oxman , Variety
"I thought this “Our Town,” the iconic play about life in small-town America, was among the very best off-Loop productions of our era. And if you don’t believe me, you should read the e-mails sent by readers who’ve seen the show" - Chris Jones, Chicago Tribune 5/9/08
'Our Town' director David Cromer does this town proud
Chris Jones , Chicago Tribune
"...cancel whatever you're doing tonight and go and see this show". - Chicago Tribune 5/2/08
'Our Town' astounds! That's right, 'Our Town'
Chris Jones , Chicago Tribune
Critic's Pick - TimeOut Chicago 5/1/08
Our Town
Brian Nemtusak , TimeOut Chicago
Highly Recommended ".. production should travel the globe... far better ambassador of "American values" than any stiff-necked consular official” - Chicago Sun Times 4/29/08
Inspired production keeps 'Our Town' clever, modern
Hedy Weiss , Chicago Sun Times
"The 43-year-old Skokie native’s body of work includes some of the most talked-about Chicago theater of the last two decades" - Kris Vire, TimeOut Chicago
Director David Cromer goes from Off Broadway to Our Town
Kris Vire , TimeOut Chicago
Critic's Choice - ".. s funny, smart, scary, and frighteningly relevant"
The Strangerer
Albert Williams , Chicago Reader
Highly Recommended - "The Hypocrites have succeeded so often through lack of competition, which is a bummer both for us and for them. If there were more theater this subversive in Chicago, the company would have both peers and rivals; each fosters quality in a different way. In the meantime, we have a weird quandary: a Miss Julie that should be seen by as many people as possible, playing in a tiny room that could hardly accommodate everyone who would appreciate it; produced at a moment when the play is relevant again but in a style that has little to do with the world around it".
Miss Julie
Christoper Piatt , TimeOut Chicago
Highly Recommended - "..imagining close-up spectators may have encouraged director Sean Graney to push his actors toward the understated, multilayered performances that give caustic immediacy to much of this potentially melodramatic showdown between a neurotic aristocrat and her opportunistic servant"
Miss Julie
Justin Hayford , Chicago Reader
It's loud and raucous, soft and introspective, freely experimental and openly nostalgic. Polish jazz in the 21st Century, in other words, is no more easily categorized than its American counterpart. That much, at least, was apparent throughout Monday night's exuberantly freewheeling All Souls' Polish Jazz Festival, which attracted a standing-room-only audience to the Chopin Theatre on West Division Street.
Putting An Accent on Jazz: All Souls Jazz Festival
Howard Reich , Chicago Tribune
Highly Recommended - "Desire" is definitely not an easy work to carry off, but with the Hypocrites' production at the Chopin Theatre studio space, director Geoff Button and his cast have created a lip-smackingly good production. And set designer Tracy Otwell deserves special applause for devising a fabulous environment -- with moist soil covering every inch of the performance space, and conjuring a sense of the hardscrabble existence and rock-strewn soil of a New England farm.
Desire Under the Elms
Hedy Weiss , Chicago Sun Times
Critic's Choice - "Geoff Button's well-crafted staging charts the characters' shifting relationships while illuminating O'Neill's vision of how the human spirit is warped by a lust for land. The production benefits from intense performances by Audrey Francis and Ian Westerfer as the lovers and from Tracy Otwell's atmospheric design, which transforms a low-ceilinged basement studio into a rustic landscape"
Desire Under the Elms
Albert Williams , Chicago Reader
Critic's Choice - “…Chicago Cinema Forum showed this at the Chopin Theatre a really indispensable place for theatrical and other artistic gatherings in this case showing film. Even though there was very little publicity -- only a couple of notices, a long review by our essential critic of cinema by Jonathan Rosenbaum in the Chicago Reader -- all of the performances announced were sold out. They even had to add a third performance.”
India Matri Bhumi
Andrew Patner , WFMT
"The phrases "standing room only -- second show added" and "Roberto Rossellini’s rarely screened 1958 film ’India Matri Bhumi’" do not sound like bedfellows..But there I was last Saturday night, in the bustling lobby of the Chopin Theatre in Wicker Park -- a community asset of the first order -- trying to weasel my way into a sold-out Rossellini screening presented by a rogue agent of the Chicago exhibition scene, the Chicago Cinema Forum. No go. Couldn’t get in".
Forum throws cinematic rarities to the lines
Michael Phillips , Chicago Tribune
Critic's Choice - " From the beginning film has owed part of its fascination to its ambiguous marriage of documentary and fiction".
When Fable and Fact Interact
Jonathan Rosenbaum , Chicago Reader
"What is it about the musty basement of Wicker Park's Chopin Theatre that brings out the best work of storefront designers?
Fool For Love - Chris Piatt
Chris Piatt , TimeOut Chicago
"What is it about the musty basement of Wicker Park’s Chopin Theatre that brings out the best work of storefront designers? Yet we’d need more than two hands to count the number of one-of-a-kind theater experiences we’ve had there".
Fool For Love
Christopher Piatt , TimeOut Chicago
"Tracks" is a TUTA remount of a 2006 production (which I didn't see), but it's not to be missed by those who missed it the first time around and who crave theater with young guts, but shaped by a director with craft.
Hottest ticket in Chicago: Tracks
Chris Jones , Chicago Tribune
Critic’s Choice & Other Best Bests this Week - " - "Book Cellar and Powell’s Books present Out of the Book, a series featuring short films about notable authors. Tonight’s event showcases Ian McEwan’s new exploration of the anxieties of love, On Chesil Beach.
Out of the Book
Chicago Reader
Highly Recommended - "Emily Schwartz’s new melodrama for the Strange Tree Group--a "murder-muzical" in which the audience decides the ending--is both exquisitely silly and genuinely witty.
Mr. Spacky
Laura Molzahn , Chicago Reader
Critic’s Pick of the Week -"It is funny, it is beyond brilliant. Don’t mistake it for a parody which is what it sounds like, it’s the best piece you’ll see this year about American politics, the news business, or existentialism."
The Strangerer
Jonathan Abarbanel and Kelly Kleiman , WBEZ, Chicago Public Radio
Critic's Pick - "The group peresents live instrumental accompaniments (music by Jude Matthews, Richard Sladek, John Elmquist and others) to modern silent films".
Sound of Silent Film
John von Rhein , Chicago Tribune
Critic’s Choice - "Guy Massey’s brilliant performance as George W. Bush anchors Theater Oobleck’s new political satire, which imagines the Decider as a present-day equivalent of Mersault, the antihero of Albert Camus’1942 novel, The Stranger. … Massey delivers a richly detailed portrait of a man whose profound isolation reflects society’s emotionally charged political, religious, and cultural schisms"
The Strangerer
Albert Williams , Chicago Reader
Critic’s Pick “spot-on performances by three character actors at the top of their game”
The Strangerer
Christopher Piatt , TimeOut Chicago
Highly Recommended - "Irish playwright Brian Friel’s tour de force tale...received a Broadway revival last year featuring the starry trio of Ralph Fiennes, Cherry Jones and Ian McDiarmid. Great actors, all. But now, in Chicago, under the bold, deeply insightful direction of Mikhael Tara Garver, the three performers in UMA Productions’ breathtakingly good revival of the play..-- easily compete with that famous lineup. Obviously there could be no greater compliment"
Faith Healer
Hedy Weiss , Chicago Sun Times
"House" is a supremely difficult drama to carry off with any degree of success... So it is a credit to director Cecilie D. Keenan and her expertly "choreographed" Teatro Vista cast that they actually manage to make "Another Part of the House" so richly atmospheric, and so true to Lorca's feverish spirit”
Another Part of the House
Hedy Weiss , Chicago Sun Times
" In Steppenwolf's glossy 2003 staging of Richard Greenberg's play, an impressive set and careful performances designed to show off the characters' cleverness made the script feel like nothing more than a precious plume of postmodern spun sugar. In Mikhael Tara Garver's rougher, considerably more intimate Uma Productions staging"..
The Violet Hour
Jack Helbig , Chicago Reader
"The proverbial good time is had by all in Signal Ensemble Theatre's production.. an embarrassment of riches"
She Stoops to Conquer
Lawrence Bommer , Chicago Reader
"Backstage Theatre Company’s ingenious, exuberant revival of Thornton Wilder’s 1942 saga is a tonic and a triumph. Over nearly three hours, director Brandon Bruce’s 16-member cast seldom strikes a false note or misses Wilder’s trenchant wisdom, treating period ballads, clever sight gags, and deft caricatures wit inexhaustible high spirits.
The Skin of Our Teeth
Lawrence Bommer , Reader
La Luna by Teatr Cogitatur produced by Chopin Theatre - “This year's best Chicago stage work ranged from against-the-odds revivals of MMPs (major `merican playwrights) to wonders of the Polish avant-garde".
Best of the Year 2005: La Luna
Michael Phillips , Chicago Tribune
Published 12/18/05
Guinea Pig Solo by Collaboraction at Chopin Theatre - “Most attempts to combine theater with multimedia bite the dust. Not this one. "
Best of the Year 2005: Guinea Pig Solo
Chris Jones , Chicago Tribune
The other night, at the Chopin Theatre's festival of European solo performance known as "I-Fest," I caught a Swiss actor and musician working mostly in German and a little bit in English, in a show called "I Am So Alone." Being an ugly American barely conversant in English, let alone languages beyond, I had doubts about being there. Yet there was no problem. There was no "language problem."
Kienberger comically plays off childhood memories
Michael Phillips , Chicago Tribune
Highly Recommended - "Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner," now in a beautifully realized Midwest premiere by Teatro Vista, the Latino company celebrating its 15th anniversary this season.
Breakfast Lunch & Dinner
Hedy Weiss , Chicago Sun Times
“No one who has seen Cogitatur's other production, "La Luna," will fail to realize that this is an ensemble with a signature style -- a theater of poetry animated by light, sound, movement, color and powerful images that seem to emerge from the darkness in a few moments of blinding luminescence, and then retreat back into the void.”
Aztec Hotel
Hedy Weiss , Chicago Sun Times
“First, a quick quiz: Q. Where will you find both the trendiest European audiences and the most European-style theater in Chicago?
A. At the Chopin Theatre.
La Luna
Hedy Weiss , Chicago Sun Times
Critic’s Choice - "Opportunities to see world-class experimental theater in Chicago are few and far between. But for three years running Chopin Theatre director Zygmunt Dyrkacz has brought Poland’s astonishing image-based Teatr Cogitatur from Katowice to Wicker Park for the U.S. premieres of its shadowy, hypnotic pieces.
La Luna
Justin Hayford , Chicago Reader
“"We have little basis for comparison in Chicago for what Poland’s visiting Teatr Cogitatur is doing in La Luna, ..Even with our army of artists that excel at visual spectacle and physical theater- from Redmoon to Plasticene to Mary Zimmerman nothing in town looks or feels like this staggering collage…What’a more even though we’ve seen endless redoubtable local companies reinvent the Chopin Theatre’s space, Teatr Cogitatur somehow demolishes it completely…”
La Luna
Christopher Piatt , TimeOut Chicago
Critic’s Pick - " I'm here to tell you that a truly excellent company, one that happens not to be from Chicago, is back in town for its third consecutive year. It's the experimental troupe from Katowice, Poland, Teatr Cogitatur, which made its American debut two years ago at Wicker Park's Chopin Theatre.
La Luna
Michael Philips , Chicago Tribune
Critic's Choice - "I've seen this play so many times I can practically repeat the lines with the actors..Seldom has it been done by anyone, however, as well as it is by the Hypocrites in this smartly directed, intensely acted production"
True West
Jack Helbig , 2005
Highly Recommended - "Consider this delicious little twist of Chicago theatrical history: At the very moment that Sam Shepard's "True West" -- the play that set the young John Malkovich on the road to celebrity -- is being revived in high style by the Hypocrites, the youthful company that injects fresh life into the 20th century dramatic rep, Malkovich himself is over on the Steppenwolf Mainstage.
True West
Hedy Weiss , Chicago Sun Times
Critic's Pick - " The latest "True West" in Chicago comes courtesy of The Hypocrites, performing in the basement space of Wicker Park's Chopin Theatre. It's an entertaining production, and the strongest element, along with Sean Graney's droll scenic design, depicting a Carter-era Southern California kitchen and Astroturfed patio, is Paul Noble's performance as Lee.
True West
Michael Philips , Chicago Tribune
"..in Anthony Moseley's searing, superbly acted production for Collaboraction, one of the best Chicago shows of the year so far, the perils of the moment get articulated with emotional force... Collaboraction tends to disappear for long periods, but it also tends to produce a show only when it has something to say. With "Guinea Pig Solo," that's demonstrably the case. It's not to be missed by those who like theater to hit the back of the gut"
Guinea Pig Solo
Chris Jones , Chicago Tribune
"There was a deep, stunned silence as the lights faded on the Collaboraction production of Brett C. Leonard's "Guinea Pig Solo" this week. Then there was thunderous applause. It was the only possible response to this altogether haunting and harrowing play.. In a just world, our government would send this production to every military base where veterans of the current war congregate. In its blazing honesty, it would provide the kind of primal catharsis rarely found on the stage"
Guinea Pig Solo
Hedy Weiss , Chicago Sun Times
“Four Dreams of Holderlin - Teatr Cogitatur produced by Chopin Theatre. - "Prime imagistic theater comes in many languages. This Polish troupe performed in English and for an hour the audience found itself inside a dream”.
Best of the Year 2004: Four Dreams of Holderlin
Michael Phillips , Chicago Tribune
Aztec Hotel by Teatr Cogitatur produced by Chopin Theatre - "Prime imagistic theater comes in many languages. This Polish troupe performed in English and for an hour the audience found itself inside a dream”.
Best of the Year 2003: Aztec Hotel
Michael Philips , Chicago Tribune
"The three performers in 500 Clown Macbeth have all done good work elsewhere..But nothing they've accomplished alone has matched the fearless work they do together in this smart, hilarious show...Lots of people do physical comedy these days, but few do it with this kind of precision, power, and intelligence"
500 Clown Macbeth
Jack Helbig , Chicago Reader
Jan Peszek produced by Chopin Theatre - "It seams like a lecture, but Peszek - using nothing but fire, water, flour, Ping-Pong balls, buckets, fishing line, a cello, and every inch of the stage - makes it looks easy. His virtuoso turn also happens to be mindless kinetic fun.
Critic's Choice - Scenario for Non-existing but Possible Instrumental Actors
Brian Nemtusak , Chicago Reader
"..Columbus' inventive staging, for Red Hen Productions, takes full advantage of the deep, high-ceilinged auditorium of the Chopin Theatre... The grand, mythic production is topped by its final scene, a stroke of high theatricality that summons up a literally heavenly ending uniting the young lovers for eternity"
The Best Theater came in Small Packages
Richard Christiansen , Chicago Tribune
“In a decade of theatrical life, "Theater With a View" has introduced this city to talented new writers, explored the aesthetic movement of magic realism, and helped collapse barriers by giving dramatic voice to the experiences and concerns of Chicago's Latino population while speaking inclusively to folks of all races...moving and ambitious play from an immensely talented writer...crisp, fluid, truthful, fast-paced and generally excellent production from Edward F. Torres"
Aurora's Motive
Chris Jones , Chicago Tribune
"A Swirling Musical Mash-Up, via Lithuania" - Neil Tesser, New York Times 3/10/11. "If Kestutis Stanciauskas has done his job right, there should be at least some degree of discomfort Saturday night at the Chopin Theater in Wicker Park —
A Swirling Musical Mash-Up, via Lithuania
New York Times
Published 3/11/11
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/11/us/11cncmusic.html?_r=2&ref=chicagonewscooperative
