Author: Robert Loerzel

Why Machinal Should Be Revived More Often

Playbill, August 2017 — Plot spoilers aren’t a big worry with Sophie Treadwell’s 1928 play Machinal. Just about every description of the expressionist drama says it was inspired by the true story of Ruth Snyder, a Queens housewife who murdered her husband and was executed at New York’s Sing Sing. Chicago’s Greenhouse Theater, which is… Continue reading Why Machinal Should Be Revived More Often

How a Government Agency Ended Up Responsible for Swing Mikado, Among Others

Playbill, July 2017 — Arts agencies consume a microscopic fraction of the $4 trillion U.S. budget. And yet government funding for the arts is controversial; calls to eliminate it never fully subside. But there was a time when the government did more than just provide grants. For a few years, the government actually had its own… Continue reading How a Government Agency Ended Up Responsible for Swing Mikado, Among Others

Good Fences Don’t Necessarily Make Good Neighbors in Native Gardens

Playbill, June 2017 — A fence divides two backyards in Native Gardens, a new play at Chicago’s Victory Gardens Theater. A white couple has lived for a long time on one side of the fence. On the other side, a Latino couple has just moved in. When you see that fence, it’s hard not to think… Continue reading Good Fences Don’t Necessarily Make Good Neighbors in Native Gardens

Lookingglass Theatre’s Reimagined ‘Moby Dick’: Interview with David Catlin

Make It Better, May-June 2017 — When David Catlin was creating Lookingglass Theatre’s stage version of “Moby Dick,” a sentence in the first chapter of Herman Melville’s novel jumped out at him. The narrator (that fellow who introduces himself by saying, “Call me Ishmael”) remarks: “I cannot tell why it was exactly that those stage managers,… Continue reading Lookingglass Theatre’s Reimagined ‘Moby Dick’: Interview with David Catlin

The Story of Chicago’s Four-Star City Flag

Medium.com, April 4, 2017 — Wallace Rice covered the floor of his living room with colorful rectangles. He’d spent six weeks combining shapes and symbols, trying to find just the right image to represent the city where he lived. He’d come up with hundreds of possibilities for a city flag design, and now he displayed his… Continue reading The Story of Chicago’s Four-Star City Flag