Pride Month in Chicago means parties, parades and performances. The Dark Lord in D.C. may have decreed that Charlie’s Aunt and As You Like It and Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro and other shows with drag roles cannot be presented at the Kennedy Center, but drag, diversity and all things LGBTQ+ continue to thrive here in sanctuary city Chicago. For Pride Month, local theaters are serving up shows to celebrate, commemorate and sometimes memorialize—us, in all our glory and infinite variety! The following are listed by performance dates. All theaters are in Chicago unless otherwise noted.
Honeypot: Black Southern Women Who Love Women; Fleetwood-Jourdain Theatre, Evanston, currently running through June 1 only (unless extended)—Although barely creeping into Pride Month, the title of this show is reason enough to include it in this list. This co-production with Northwestern University Theatre Department is adapted from the book by E. Patrick Johnson, and staged by Fleetwood-Jourdain artistic director Tim Rhoze and adapter D. Soyini Maadison. FYI: Next November, Fleetwood-Jourdain will offer a new piece based on a famous PBS 1971 conversation between James Baldwin and Nikki Giovanni.
Scandalous Boy; Open Space Arts, currently running through June 28—A play about the greatest gay love affair of the Roman Empire—the beautiful Antinous and Emperor Hadrian—should have a longer run during Pride Month . . . and maybe it will, especially since Open Space Arts seats only 25 max at a time. Benjamin Mills directs this American premiere by Australian playwright David Atfield. The play concerns how Antinous navigates imperial politics and his own affairs of body and heart. Hey, how many of us wind up as gods, except in our own minds?
MY Cabaret: Dragaret (sic); Briny Swine Smokehouse & Oyster Bar, Friday, June 20, and then first Saturday of each month, through Dec. 6—Infamous divas Muffy Fishbasket and Mrs. Yuka Layme bring their naughty cabaret act to Lincoln Park for an extended run. They sing live—no lip-sync allowed—so even the animals in the Lincoln Park Zoo can hear them! Which reminds us of a limerick: “There was a zoo keeper named Rob/Who took things in hand on the job . . .” etc.
You Will Get Sick, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, June 5 (previews)-July 13—This Chicago premiere features Steppenwolf Ensemble members Amy Morton, Namir Smallwood and Cliff Chamberlain in Noah Diaz’s play about a young gay man who contracts a life-threatening disease, and the older woman he hires to help him deal with it. Somehow, The Wizard of Oz is involved in things, too! Running under 90 minutes, it’s described as both surreal and at least half-a-comedy. The director is Audrey Francis, Steppenwolf co-artistic director.
Angels in America, Parts I & II; Invictus Theatre (@ Windy City Playhouse), June 13 (previews)-Sept. 7—Both parts of Tony Kushner’s powerful and justly-celebrated “Gay Fantasia on National Themes” will be presented in repertory in a three-months run by Invictus, an award-winning troupe which takes on big, difficult works. Angels is set at the peak of the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s when POTUS Ronald Reagan would not say “gay” in public. In an irony of history, Donald Trump’s political teacher—the vicious, self-loathing, closeted Roy Cohn—is a major character. Of course, part of the brilliance of Angels in America is how Kushner combines real figures with fictional ones. If only Roy Cohn was fictional! Invictus artistic director Charles Askenaizer is at the helm.
The Color Purple; Goodman Theatre; June 21 (previews)-July 25—A major new staging of the 2005 Tony Award-winning musical, based on the celebrated and moving epistolary novel by Alice Walker about the coming-out and coming-of-age of an exploited young black woman in the early 20th century Deep South. The Goodman production is helmed by the estimable Lili-Anne Brown. The musical retains the fervor and heartbreak of the book, and the joyful, healing final triumph. Jermaine Hill is music director and Breon Arzell is choreographer.
Also in June…
So much for shows specific to LGBTQ stories and/or characters. For those looking for something sort-of gayish, or kind-of campy, there is a lot of musical fare from which to choose. Without going into all the details, if you’re the type of person who waited in a rainstorm at Soldier Field for Beyonce, you just might enjoy any or all of these.
Already running: Titanique, the hits of Celine Dion sink Jack and Rose and the Titanic, Porchlight Theatre at the Broadway Playhouse, through July 13; Diana the Musical, Joe DiPietro and David Bryan’s take on Princess Di, and how she shook up the Royals, Theo Cabaret Theatre, through July; and, if you really must, again,Cats, meow and forever, Paramount Theatre (Aurora), through June 15.
Opening soon: The Marvelous Wonderettes, it’s Prom Nite as a femme quartet performs “Mr. Sandman,” “It’s My Party,” “Respect” and other ‘50s-‘60s girl hits, at the Oil Lamp Theater (Glenview), June 6-29; Always Something There . . ., a world premiere jukebox musical that pays homage to 80s teen flicks, with songs by Madonna, Culture Club, The Go-Gos, etc., at Marriott Theatre in Lincolnshire, June 8 (previews)-August 10; Forever Plaid, with their crewcuts, pompadours, tuxes and plaid cummerbunds, this boy quartet doesn’t remember the car crash but sure remember those 50s tight-harmony songs, presented by MadKap (sic) Productions at the Skokie Theatre, June 20-29.
Jonathan Abarbanel is a member of the American Theatre Critics Association. He was Windy City Times theater editor for many years and continues to review weekly for “The Arts Section” on WDCB-FM Public Radio.