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In the dicey business of bringing historic opera to contemporary audiences, Lyric Opera’s current production of Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades is a winner. Three hours and 45 minutes long? Sung in Russian? No problem; deal me in. This exploration of obsession is compulsively watchable.

Said to have been composed in a 44-day frenzy, the opera is based on an Alexander Pushkin story about an obsessive gambler–a subject Pushkin knew firsthand. The opera (with a libretto by Modest Tchaikovsky, the composer’s brother), expanding on this theme, is about obsessive ideation that fixes on romance as well as gambling, before moving on to guilt.

The central character, Gherman (tenor Brandon Jovanovich), is hell-bent on possessing both Lisa (soprano Sondra Radvanovsky), a woman he’s fallen in love with at first sight, and a dangerous secret her grandmother happens to possess that will allow him to win at cards. Lisa’s a stretch for this impoverished outsider–she’s engaged to marry a prince (baritone Lucas Meachem). Against the odds, Gherman succeeds in winning her heart, but–and this is the crux of the story–driven as he is, he can’t stop there. He persists in his quest for her grandmother’s secret, leading to a devastating final loss.

This is psychodrama powered by the sweep and emotional acuity of Tchaikovsky’s Russian romantic score. The 20-year-old production, originally directed by Richard Jones, with sets and costumes by John Macfarlane (directed here by Benjamin Davis), moves the action up to the tense grey 1930s. It makes use of puppets, graveyard humor, and surreal shifts in perspective to weave an increasingly claustrophobic and ominous spell. Radvanovsky and Jovanovich powerfully, wrenchingly, give voice to their characters, and everyone in the huge cast–including the Lyric Opera Chorus and members of the Chicago Children’s Choir–plays up to their game.

Musically, it’s an embarrassment of riches, starting with the trio of men who launch the action: tenor Kyle van Schoonhoven and bass-baritone David Weigel as Gherman’s associates, and bass-baritone Samuel Youn–Alberich in Lyric’s Ring–in another neatly executed nasty turn as Gherman’s pernicious friend Count Tomsky. Then there’s a trio of mighty mezzo sopranos: Jill Grove as a governess; Elizabeth DeShong as Lisa’s friend Pauline; and spot-on veteran Jane Henschel making her Lyric debut as Lisa’s grandmother, the Countess, once known as the Venus of Moscow.

Also, of course, the Lyric Opera Orchestra. A more traditional Queen of Spades was the first opera Andrew Davis conducted as Lyric’s music director. As he heads into his final season in that job (he’ll depart in 2021), this production is an apropos bookend to his 20-year tenure. v

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The Des McAnuff-directed Summer: The Donna Summer Musical begins with a seasoned Donna Summer, or Diva Donna (Dan’yelle Williamson), recounting how in her early days, a colleague asked her what people will be doing years from then. She responded she didn’t know, but one thing’s for sure: they’d be dancing.

Though the “The Queen is Back” opening number was crowded with several dancers and somewhat blinding outfits on stage, what follows is a fascinating exploration of a life well lived. This touring musical (book by Colman Domingo, Robert Cary, and McAnuff, featuring hits created by Summer, Giorgio Moroder, Paul Jabara, and others) breezes through the stages of Summer’s life, from childhood as Duckling Donna (Olivia Elease Hardy) growing up in Boston to Disco Donna (Alex Hairston) who becomes the queen of 1970s disco, to Diva Donna, who wants to slow down and enjoy family life.

Throughout the production Diva Donna provides context to what’s happening in her life and in her head. Moments of joyous relief, angry thought, and everything else in between is expressed by older Donna, who now has the wisdom to understand the sometimes-reckless decisions of others and herself and breaks it all down for the audience.

From top to bottom, the production is all glitter, sparkle, afros, leather and animal print: a testament to the glamorous life of the legendary singer. (Paul Tazewell created the costumes, with wig design by Charles G. LaPointe.) Yet the glamour was not without difficulties.

In every stage of life, she has loved and lost, in one way or the other. As a child, she lost friends in church who said her voice sounded like a police siren. Donna of the disco era fired (and sued) her manager Neil Bogart (John Gardiner) when she learned he was misappropriating her money, and Diva Donna suffered an ultimate loss, laying her parents to rest. Yet still, the groovy performer persisted.

Messages of independence and equal pay loom large when Donna’s lawsuit against Casablanca Records comes up, accompanied by an energetic and profound performance of “She Works Hard for the Money” that’s enough to make every member of the audience as angry as the singer must have been upon learning that she hadn’t been receiving the fair fruits of her labor.

A standout moment from this number is when an unnamed lawyer (Brooke Lacy) reveals that Donna is in an exploitative contract and says, “This may be disingenuous coming from a middle-aged white guy like me.” Though played for laughs, it’s hard to miss the sheer amount of women playing people presumed to be men throughout the production. From top hats and suits to short wigs and canes, a subtle, yet forthright, statement is made about how in the high point of Donna’s career, gender lines were blurred within the disco (and often queer) community, as they are now.

Summer’s struggle with the antidepressant Marplan and suicidal thoughts are stepping-stones to her recovery from the pressures of a fast-paced career, showing how the disco queen dealt with her own depression and anxiety offstage.

The final scenes of the musical end before her demise; she and her daughters sing “Stamp your Feet” from 2008’s Crayons (her last studio album), when she discloses she has cancer. And “Friends Unknown” honors friends who died of HIV/AIDs years prior, offering possible hope of redemption for her rumored past hurtful remarks about a community who adored her. (Summer reportedly said “God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve” at a 1983 concert, though she denied ever calling AIDS “divine retribution.”) From there, up-tempo “Hot Stuff” and “Last Dance” close the production.

At the end of it all, Donna Summer proved herself to be more than just the “disco queen” of the 70s. But even if she’s only remembered for disco music, Summer reminds us that that’s A-OK, too. v

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Whether you want to feel the love or not this weekend, there’s plenty of recommended things to do.

Through 2/28: Bonny Nahmias’s first solo exhibition, “To Hold Space,” presents a project that she began in 2017. Stretching a tin can telephone over areas that are broken by geography, modernity, and politics, she has surpassed barriers and blockades. The project is accompanied by a book, The Orchestra Of Space Holders. Opening reception is Fri 2/14, 6-10 PM. Ground Level Platform, 2001 S. Halsted, groundlevelplatform.org, free.

2/14-2/16: Violet Surprise Theatre presents Lez Beaus, a festival of 10-minute plays celebrating lesbian love through the ages. The dozen pieces, selected by artistic directors Iris Sowlat and Allison Fradkin, include stories about romance in an all-girls baseball league of the past and a “girl gets boi” love story set in contemporary times. Fri-Sat 7:30 PM, Sun 3 PM, the Martin, 2515 W. North, themartinchicago.com, $12.

Fri 2/14: Anti-Valentine’s Day is celebrating National Condom Week and has partnered with sexual health organizations to provide free condoms and sexual health education to teenagers. There will be music, dancing, crafts, pizza, cheese, games, and, of course, condoms. 6-9 PM, National Museum of Mexican Art, 1852 W. 19th, nationalmuseumofmexicanart.org, free.

Fri 2/14: Odd Pleasures: A Queer Valentine’s Day Event features a queer variety show hosted by Aunty Chan that includes live ASMR, drag, comedy, and short films. 6-9 PM, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, 220 E. Chicago, mcachicago.org, $10, $8 students.

Fri 2/14: Love is Stronger than the State: a Migrant Solidarity Benefit is a fundraiser for a family seeking asylum as well as a trans person who recently migrated to Chicago. Featuring food, drink, activities for children, nail art by Sharon, a Cupid Photo Booth, and a raffle with art by Rebel Betty and Audra Jacot. No one turned away for lack of funds. 7 PM-midnight, the #LetUsBreathe Collective, 1434 W. 51st, facebook.com/ChicagoIWOC, $5-$10 suggested donation.

Sat 2/15: The Marz Record Fair, organized by Marz Brewing and Mississippi Records, features vendors and DJs from International Anthem, Sonorama, Electric Jungle, Shady Rest Vintage & Vinyl, Black Pegasus, 606 Records, Delmark, Orindal Records, Tone Deaf Records, South Rhodes Records, Atlantic Posters, Maximum Pelt, DJ Leslie Deckard, and Mississippi Records. Noon-8 PM, Marz Community Brewing Taproom, 3630 S. Iron, marz.beer, free.

Sat 2/15: Author Angela Kenyatta shares her knowledge of journaling and writing during a workshop at the library for Black History Month. 2 PM, Sulzer Regional Library, 4455 N. Lincoln, chipublib.org, free.

Sat 2/15: The one-night-only show The Witch Project looks at witches and queer icons through spoken word, live music, and drag. 7:30 PM, Den Theatre, 1331 N. Milwaukee, thedentheatre.com, $15.

Sat 2/15: The Half-Court Classic 3v3 Invitational is a celebration of basketball culture with a three on three tournament and complimentary food and beverages, hosted by Kyle O’Quinn and organized by Lululemon Chicago and Mob Rep with Cool Kids, Femdot, Qari, DJ Evie the Cool, DJ Cash Era, DJ Selah Say. 8 PM-1 AM, 454 N. Armour, bit.ly/lululemon-and-mob-rep-present-the-half-court-classic-tickets, $20.

Sat 2/15: Super Tasty is an inclusive, sex-positive talk show that is poppin’ off for a special Valentine’s Day weekend edition. Performers include Clitora Leigh and Lavender Vyxn, and interviews with Dr. Pia Holec about sexpectations. There will be a sensual massage demo and a panel with sex coach Tazima Parris and therapists Matthew Amador and Peter Navarro. Stay for the AfterGlow where the stage opens up for a shopping experience from local vendors. 8 PM, Constellation 3111 N. Western, supertastyshow.com, $25.

Sun 2/16: The Fox Club has joined with GMan Tavern to sell handmade and vintage goods at the Winter Sucks Market. Drink specials and vendors will be present with a free admission. Noon-5 PM, GMan Tavern, 3740 N. Clark, gmantavern.com, free.

Sun 2/16: The two-person event “The landscape reels back” features, curator, arts organizer, and Chicago artist Alexis Brocchi, who looks at how to search for information through nontraditional methods, and Tracie Hayes, an artist and ecologist. 4-7 PM, Roman Susan, 1224 W. Loyola, romansusan.org, free.

Sun 2/16: Stand-up Marty DeRosa hosts the Second Annual Davefest, a fundraiser for the David Carl Guastella Scholarship Foundation featuring comedy from Blake Burkhart, Cameron Gillette, Nate Burrows, and more plus music by Natalie Grace Alford and Sammy Arechar. 8:30 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, emptybottle.com, $10. vRead More

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Dan Shore started working on his one-act opera, Freedom Ride, nine years ago. It was the 50th anniversary of the Congress of Racial Equality-organized protests that actually integrated public transportation in the United States, after the Supreme Court had ruled that segregation violated the constitution. Shore, a composer who also writes his own librettos, was teaching at Xavier University of Louisiana in New Orleans and had been asked to create something that would celebrate both that city and the civil rights movement. When he saw the 2011 PBS Freedom Riders documentary (based on Raymond Arsenault’s 2007 book of the same title), and also learned that Xavier had provided housing for some of the riders, he had found his subject. Research, writing, and workshopping followed.

Freedom Ride’s world premiere production, commissioned by Chicago Opera Theater, opened Saturday at the Studebaker. Under Tazewell Thompson’s direction, it’s a fast-paced 90-minute account of how a fictional New Orleans woman, Sylvie Davenport, decided to sign on for the risky ride to Jackson, Mississippi. We see her motivation grow, from a hoped-for personal relationship with the recruiter at the start, to something broader and more deeply principled. Ultimately she makes the trip in spite of his rejection of her and over her family’s well-grounded fears. In real life, freedom riders were beaten, fire-bombed, arrested, and imprisoned.

There’s a large cast of characters, including Sylvie’s mother, brother, and best friend, Ruby; preachers and organizers; assorted volunteers, and two sizeable choruses, one of which is made up of children. It’s a lot of people and story to process in a one-act, and the result, on opening night, was arguably more successful as a song cycle than a fully-developed opera. It might not have helped that the announced lead, soprano Lauren Michelle, was missing (for personal reasons, according to COT), though her understudy, Dara Rahming, stepped smoothly into the role of Sylvie. In fact, Rahming has sung this role before, and, Shore said in a pre-performance talk, he created it with her in mind.

The switch also allowed us to see soprano Kimberly E. Jones, a Chicago favorite, in Rahming’s place as Ruby. Among the rest of this talented cast: baritone Robert Sims, hitting the right dramatic and vocal notes as the organizer, Clayton Thomas; recent Ryan Opera Center alum Whitney Morrison in a bitter protest against rocking the boat; and a winning performance by tenor Tyrone Chambers II as Sylvie’s brother, Russell. The music–which Shore says was inspired by everything he was hearing in the Big Easy–ranges from gospel, blues, and spirituals to a “barbershop” quartet. It’s not nuanced: when a Jewish character thinks of his past, for example, the audience is flashed a hora. But Shore has produced an often rousing score that brings an important chapter of American history to life. COT Music Director Lidiya Yankovskaya conducts the Chicago Sinfonietta. v

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After years of reading the women-seeking-women Reader Matches ads and never seeing any I felt called to respond to, I just could not get hers out of my mind: “kick-boxing babe,” “Xena-lover,” “giver of tender back rubs,” “looking for articulate romance with a queer cutie.” She didn’t mention a size or shape of body that she was looking for. She didn’t talk about anything I found boring or stupid. The ad stuck with me all week, but I didn’t act. I was fat. I had almost zero dating experience. Calling a stranger was SCARY.

My roommate locked me in my room on the last night that the ad’s voice mail was active and refused to let me out until I left a message. So after wasting hours alone in my room, I finally left a voice message: “I’m fat and swear like a sailor,” “I grew tomatoes for the first time this year,” “I’m an art student.”

I could not believe it when she called me back! I was so nervous when the phone rang, but we had a long and easy conversation touching on things like the fact that her brother and I had the same pinup girl mobile, why marriage is stupid, and all the ways that monogamy is fraught. Then we set a time to meet in person the next week for our first date.

That was in October 1998. She gave me a tender kiss as I was getting out of her car. I gave her a tiny box of the tomatoes I grew in my garden. Twenty-one years later, we have a ten-year-old kid, a solid, loving relationship, and a yard with too much shade to grow tomatoes. –Searah Deysach

Josh: We were both recent divorcees looking for love.

Sheri: A friend asked me to help her write a personal ad in the Reader, and I decided to create one for myself too.

J: This was back in the days when online dating was shameful. I complimented her on her book choices, except for Ayn Rand.

S: Rand is great dark fiction. I waited a month until Christmas to respond.

J: After some e-mails back and forth, we talked on the phone and met for pizza.

S: I was training for the marathon and had just run ten miles, so I almost cancelled.

J: We both had friends call us as backup plans to bail just in case things went south.

S: Or in case he was a psychopath. We immediately connected on books, cats, and all things nerdy. It was love at first sight.

J: After dinner we went to the Green Dolphin ballroom with friends. The band started playing “September” by Earth, Wind, and Fire.

S: He asked me to dance and that sealed the deal. The conversation turned to architecture. I was curious about the Baha’i Temple.

J: My friends suggested we go on a tour. Our second date was set for the next morning!

S: Before the tour he took me to breakfast at Walker Brothers for pancakes. We started hanging out every day and the rest is history!

J: Fast-forward six years to our wedding.

S: Fast-forward again to 2019 when we both had articles published in the Reader side-by-side!

J: That’s what I call a full-circle Reader Romance! –Josh and Sheri Flanders v

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In 2017, First Floor Theater premiered Leah Nanako Winkler’s Two Mile Hollow–a send-up of what Winkler terms “white people by the water” plays, in which a wealthy clan gathers at a beach house to fight, reveal secrets, and reminisce. The catch for Winkler’s work was that the characters were all played by people of color, offering ironic counterpoint to white privilege’s ridiculous insularity.

Lydia Diamond’s Stick Fly, which had its world premiere in 2006 with Chicago’s Congo Square before eventually opening on Broadway in 2011, has some things in common with the world that Winkler parodied. But Diamond’s family is actually Black and wealthy, with long roots in Martha’s Vineyard and Romare Bearden paintings on the wall. Diamond, who grew up the daughter of an academic, has written about the collisions of class and race within and without Black families and communities in several works. In Stick Fly, now revived at Writers Theatre under Ron OJ Parson’s direction, the outlines of the traditional “well-made play” serve her well in anatomizing the subtle but hurtful hypocrisies and internalized self-loathing that keep the characters from fully connecting.

The title comes from the work that Taylor (Jennifer Latimore), an entomologist from an economically lower class, does with examining insects; they have to be secured to a stick in order to document their wing movements. But things rapidly become unglued over the course of a few days, as Taylor’s fiance Kent (Eric Gerard) faces the disdain his neurosurgeon father Joe (David Alan Anderson) has for his nascent career as a novelist, compared to the chip-off-the-old-block attitude Dad has toward his eldest, plastic surgeon Flip (DiMonte Henning), who brings Kimber (Kayla Raelle Holder), an old-school WASP, to meet the family. Meantime Cheryl (Ayanna Bria Bakari), daughter of the family maid, learns the truth about her parentage.

Diamond’s writing works against the grain of the potentially soapy plotlines, and each character gets at least one moment to burst through social constraints to reveal what they’re really thinking. (Latimore’s Taylor more than the rest.) Old history (familial and otherwise) collides with present-day realities, and by the end of Diamond’s wise and funny play (well acted across the board here), everyone’s wings have been clipped by reality. v

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Adapted by Marilyn Abrams and Bruce Jordan from the original play Scherenschnitt, (scissors cut), by German playwright Paul Portner, Shear Madness is not so much a fully realized work of comic theater as a kind of silly party game writ large. The premise is reminiscent of interactive murder mysteries: setting–a beauty salon; characters–a brace of stereotypes (gay hair dresser, ditsy beautician, bulldog homicide detective); McGuffin–the murder of an upstairs neighbor. But the real mystery is why we should care about the death of a character we never meet. This is theater for people who don’t know much about theater, and comedy for audiences drunk enough to laugh at anything. (The snack bar serves alcohol that you can take into the auditorium.)

The current Mercury Theater Chicago revival, directed by Warner Crocker, is by design tipsy and “fun.” Actors break character all the time, ad lib ad nauseum, or fake cracking up (like the late Harvey Korman used to do way too often on The Carol Burnett Show). And then about halfway through it all the fourth wall is ripped down, and the audience is invited to “participate” in the “solving” of the “murder.” I suppose this kind of thing must have seemed daring in 1963, when Portner’s original play opened. But today the premise is too tired to even be called retro. There is nothing novel about Crocker’s point-and-click direction.

Still, the casting is great. In the leads, Ed Kross and Brittany D. Parker get lots of chances to show off their comic chops. But the flashes of comic brilliance they and the rest of the cast display from time to time make one wish they were in a real play. v

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Before Ta-Nehisi Coates laid out “The Case for Reparations” in the Atlantic in 2014, Lorraine Hansberry’s 1959 classic A Raisin in the Sun clearly showed the effects of racism on Black Americans seeking better living conditions–a problem we’ve yet to fully address. The Younger family–so cramped for space in their roach-infested apartment that son Travis has to sleep on the living room couch–hopes to buy a better piece of the American pie, thanks to a life insurance payout from their late husband and father. But what that pie looks like varies wildly, and Invictus Theatre Company’s current revival of Raisin, directed by Aaron Reese Boseman, honors those conflicting dreams with conviction and heart.

Matriarch Lena (Cheryl Frazier) wants to buy a house, even if that means moving to an unfriendly white neighborhood. Her son, Walter Lee (Michael Lewis), wants to stop being a driver for white people and take the wheel of his own destiny by buying into a liquor store. His little sister, Beneatha (Ashley Joy), wants to be a doctor and is torn between a bourgeois beau, George (Keith Surney), who is interested in her as arm candy, and a Nigerian student, Joseph (Jo Schaffer), who offers a broader vista for her life. Meantime, Ruth (Nyajai Ellison), Walter’s wife, is facing an unexpected pregnancy and anguish about her husband’s growing anger about his deferred dreams.

Hansberry crammed a lot of life into that small flat (the story is based in part on her own family’s legal challenge to racist restrictive housing covenants), and Boseman’s production goes for broke with heartfelt zest, spilling over the edge of Kevin Rolfs’s appropriately tiny dingy set. On opening night, there were some moments where the actors didn’t feel completely connected to each other, but it’s clear that they know these characters’ hurts and hopes to the bone, and I suspect the ensemble will grow even stronger over the run. v

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Kate Hendrickson directs the Chicago premiere of Krista Knight’s Lipstick Lobotomy, an arch but moving 2019 play about mental illness, conformity, and the search for understanding in World War ll-era America. When Ginny (Ann Sonneville) checks into an upper-crust sanitarium hoping to be cured of obsessive thinking and persistent depression, she immediately latches on to Rosemary (Abby Blankenship), an unruly fellow patient and the eldest daughter of kingmaker Joseph Kennedy. What starts out as an over-the-top comic skewering of social mores gains a tragic gravity as the “cure” for the women’s illnesses comes into sharper focus.

Ginny’s and Rosemary’s families want them to fit in and not embarrass them, so they resort to the latest, largely-unproven procedures to correct their behavior. When Rosemary’s lobotomy goes so badly that it leaves her permanently incapacitated, Ginny is forced to rethink her ardent desire to follow her friend into the operating room.

The conflict between the desire to be like everyone else and to hold on to what makes one unique is an evergreen problem, given a twist in Knight’s cheerfully tragic text. Each era has its quack cures that look barbaric in hindsight. I have no doubt that many 2020 treatments for mental and emotional troubles will be considered savage and inept within a couple decades. So cutting out chunks of brain matter to make women behave is, sadly, not as outlandishly archaic as it should be. The horrific final image of a roomful of patients dancing and singing in grotesque smile masks is now lodged in my head like a bad dream. v

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