PBS PREMIERES FERGUSON DOC "WHOSE STREETS?" ON POV MON NITE 9PM ET

PREMIERES MONDAY JULY 30 9PMCT ON PBS/WTTW

  Sabaah Folayan (r) discussesher film Whose Streets?

Brittany Ferrell of Millennial Activists United leads a protest

by Dwight Casimere

"An unseen war" is how one resident of Ferguson, Missouri describes the way of life for the people left behind in the wake of the killing of Michael Brown by police. The unarmed teenager was killed on August 9, 2014. His body was left lying in the street for hours. Police erected a temporary wall around the body as a barricade to keep people away, but did nothing to remove the body in a timely fashion, thus exacerbating feelings of rage.  A makeshift shrine remains at the site where Brown shed his blood and a generation of teens continues to raise their voice in protest. 

The Black Lives Matter movement found its genesis in Ferguson and its voice is echoed in the PBS  POV series documentary "WHOSE STREETS? TRACING A PEOPLE'S MOVEMENT,  which premieres  MONDAY, JULY 30 9pm CT on the award-winning  Emmy (37 awards) and Peabody (21 awards)PBS series POV at 9pm ET.  Directed by Sabaah Folayan and co-directed by Damon Davis, the film examines the unhealed wounds of the Ferguson shooting through the eyes of the activists who found their purpose in its aftermath. 25 year old Brittany Ferrell, a nursing student and mother of a young daughter, founded the group Millennial Activists United, with her partner Alexis Templeton. David Whitt, a husband and father of four, who was alerted to the killing by shots ringing outside his door, picked up a camera to document the police and town official's heavy-handed response. 

"Whose Streets?" is a documentary that chronicles one of the pivotal events of our time. Ironically, writer/director Sabaah Folayan is a native of South Central Los Angeles, scene of another pivotal moment in the nation's bloody racial history, the riots in the wake of the Rodney King beating. She organized the Millions March, the largest protest in New York City  for racial justice following the police choking death of Eric Garner. 

An advocate for prison reform, she interviewed incarcerated people about their traumatic experience. Woven throughout the film are quotes from Malcolm X, Martin Luher King, Jr. Sojourner Truth and others. Early in the film, the point is made that St. Louis is also the birthplace of the infamous Dred Scott Decision of 1857, in which a black man who sued for his freedom received the ruling from the Supreme Court that neither he nor any other person of African ancestry could claim citizenship in the United States. The irony is not lost on the viewer.

POV is American television's longest-running independent documentary series, now in its 31st year. "Whose Streets?" is a co-presentation with the National Black Programming Consortium and was an Official Selection at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival.  The film's indelible images and plaintive  voices will resonate long after its airing. 

 

CHICAGO YACHT CLUB 110TH RACE TO MACKINAC HAS SLOPPY, DEADLY START

SAILOR MISSING IN SEVERE WEATHER CONDITIONS AT THE STARTING LINE

 WAVES OF 6-8 FEET PREVAILED ON LAKE MICHIGAN AT THE RACE START

 DDWIGHT CASIMERE WEATHERING THE STORM AT THE STARTING LINE

 GETTING A STEADY PICTURE WAS A REAL  CHALLENGE IN THE STEEP CHOP

 HEAVY WINDS KEPT MANY BOATS FROM MAKING HEADWAY AT THE START

CREW MEMBERS KEEP THE BOAT ON THE WIND IN A SAILING MANEUVER

BELOW: CHICAGO SKYLINE OBSCURED IN HIGH WINDS AND FOG AT RACE START

by Dwight Casimere

Choppy seas and sloppy weather conditions marred the start of the Chicago Yacht Club 110th Race to Mackinac, considered the nation's premiere yachting event. Further, a man lost at sea following a report of a man overboard, on the race boat, Imedi, in the Turbo section, considered the largest and fastest of the 306 boats in the race, resulted in 39 boats returning to the Chicago Yacht Club, ending their race participation. The missing sailor has been identified as 53 year old Jon Santarelli of Lincoln Park.

The first-to-finish was the veteran racing boat Il Mostro helmed by Peter Thornton and his three generation crew of co-skippers which included his 19 year old son Jack and nephew Brodin. The boat last did such a finish in 2012. For more information on the race, visit ChicagoYachtClub.org.

GAUGUIN: VOYAGE TO TAHITI IN LIMITED ENGAGEMENT AT GENE SISKEL FILM CENTER CHICAGO

CHICAGO PREMIERE OF FILM DEPICTING THE TORMENT AND TRIUMPH OF PAINTER PAUL GAUGUIN IN THE SPLENDOR OF PARADISE

 VINCENT CASSEL  AND TUHEI ADAMS AS TEHURA IN GAUGUIN: VOYAGE TO TAHITI

 FILM DIRECTOR AND CINEMATOGRAPHER EDOUARD DELUC ON LOCATION IN TAHITI

 TAHITIAN CHILDREN DISCOVER GAUGUIN'S PAINTS AS THE COUPLE ENJOYS A BIT OF SOLACE

By Dwight Casimere 

Edouard Deluc's exquisite film Gauguin: Voyage to Tahiti is in  limited engagement beginning Friday July 20 at The Gene Siskel Film Center in Chicago's Loop. A fictionalized account of the tortured genius's phenomenal life,  the film recounts his eschewing of the Bourgeois life of 1890s  Paris and its contrasting  Bohemian culture,  

Abandoning his wife and five children in a smelly,  ramshackle loft in Paris, Paul Gauguin ventured to Tahiti. Vincent Cassel, with his deep set eyes and craggy face with lines dug in like the wood block etchings Gauguin created to depict his magical new world, gives life and breath to the artist's angst and brief moments of  joy . 

Deluc's deft directing and sweeping panoramic lens capture the all -encompassing glory of this strange new world of Tahiti and its mystical mountains, hills, and valleys. Tuhei Adam's is luminous as the artist's common law wife Tehura.

 As quickly as Gauguin discovers his paradise found it becomes paradise lost in a devolution of jealousy, poverty and Ill health. The demons that at once drove him to the brink of destruction simultaneously fueled his painterly genius. It is an arresting paradox that is captured with excruciating  clarity in Deluc's captivating film.

Despite being in French and Tahitian with English subtitles, the emotions in the film are conveyed so precisely in both the scenic visuals and in  the actor's expressions and gestures, the viewer quickly becomes  immersed in Gauguin's troubled psyche and glorious milieu. So transparent are the emotional portrayals that almost no translation is necessary.

Gauguin: Voyage to Tahiti is at once a recounting of one man's heroic journey of self-discovery and an artist's rendering of our own inner longings and desires. For showtimes and ticket information visit siskelfilmcenter

BROADWAY IN CHICAGO THE COLOR PURPLE REVIVAL AT THE AUDITORIUM THEATRE THROUGH JULY 29

A STUNNING REVIVAL OF TONY AWARD-WINNING MUSICAL IN TWO-WEEK RUN AT AUDITORIUM THEATRE

 ADRIANNA HICKS AS CELIE (CENTER IN YELLOW PANTS, AND BELOW) LEADS AN ALL-STAR CAST IN THE BROADWAY IN CHICAGO REVIVAL OF THE COLOR PURPLE

Photos: Matthew Murphy for The Color Purple

by Dwight Casimere

The Broadway in Chicago revival of the double Tony Award-winning musical(2016 Best Musical Revival), The Color Purple, now in a limited two-week run at Chicago's Auditorium Theatre of Roosevelt University (50 E. Congress) now through July 29, is just as powerful and relevant today as it was in its debut, particularly in light of the current #metoo movement. 

Few can forget the powerful impact of Stephen Spielberg's film adaptation of Alice Walker Pulitzer Prize-winning 1982 novel, The Color Purple, starring Danny Glover, Whoopi Goldberg and Oprah Winfrey. The film earned 11 Oscar nominations, including a Best Actress nod to Whoopi in her maiden voyage before the cameras and a Best Supporting bid for Oprah, also in her first major film outing.

The film was notable, not only for the fact that it was Spielberg's first attempt at a film that was not in his normal summer blockbuster mode (and not scored by the ubiquitous John Williams), but it was also notable for its bold, in-your-face, exploration of subjects considered anathema in a general audience film, be it black-oriented or otherwise; rape, incest, spousal abuse, misogyny, homosexuality, to name just a few. Yet,what emerges is a story that celebrates the human spirit and its eventual triumph against all odds. 

With a book by Marsha Norman and music and lyrics by Grammy-nominated songwriting legend Brenda Russell (Piano In The Dark, If Only For One Night, Get Here), Allee Willis (Grammy-winner, Beverly Hills Cop soundtrack) and Stephen Bray (the original production of Color Purple in 2005, producer and songwriter for Madonna, Gladys Knight and Kylie Minogue) and directed by the Tony Award-winning director of the original production and Sweeney Todd. John Doyle, the revival of The Color Purple is the summer's must-see stage production.

The superlative touring cast led by the original cast members from the 2016 Broadway revival, including Adrianna Hicks as Celie, Carla R. Stewart as Shug Avery and Carrie Compere as Sofia, are joined by the electrifying Gavin Gregory in the pivotal role of Mister, N'Jameh Camara as Celie's long-lost sister Nettie, a major plot point role, and J. Daughtry as Harpo.

The performances and the singing are top-drawer in every way, particularly the sex-charged dance number from Carla R. Stewart as Shug, the powerful soliloquy from Gavin Gregory as Mister which reached the proportion of an operatic aria, and of, course, Adrianna Hicks who took the audience on an unforgettable journey of self-discovery as Celie. 

There were only a couple of annoying distractions that marred an otherwise flawless production; the inexplicable clatter of footsteps form the ensemble cast on the floorboards as it emerged onstage during several of the musical's most poignant ballads and the monotonous backdrop of floor to rafter broken wood panels with towering rows of elevated chairs, which seemed meaningless once the story progressed. An maginative use of lighting and perhaps some projected visual backdrops might have better served this production and freshened it up for today's multi-media savvy audience. 

These are mere quibbles considering the solid, soul-stirring performances throughout the evening. I left the theatre feeling hopeful, energized and emotionally rejuvenated.

For tickets and information visit BroadwayInChicago.com.

 Carla R. Stewart (l) as Shug Avery and Adrianna Hicks as Celie, declare their love for each other

 Adrianna Hicks as Celie in a powerful moment

 Bianca Horn (Ensemble/Church Lady), Adrianna Hicks (Celie), Gavin Gregory (Mister), N’Jameh Camara (Nettie) and Angela Birchett (Ensemble/Church Lady)

 Gavin Gregory sings his transformative aria in one of the musical's pivotal moment

 Celie (Adrianna Hicks) in a revelatory moment

 Erica Durham asserts herself against male dominance as Squeak

 Carla R. Stewart sets the stage ablaze as Shug Avery brings down the house

 Carrie Compere (Sofia) and J. Daughtry (Harpo) in a little theatrical 'foreplay'

Adrianna Hicks (Celie) and N'Jameh Camara (Nettie) In the Broadway In Chicago Revival

STACY KEACH IS ERNEST HEMINGWAY IN GOODMAN THEATRE'S PAMPLONA THROUGH JULY 19

by Dwight Casimere

 Stacy Keach onstage as Ernest Hemingway in Jim McGrath's Pamplona

 The author at the height of his career

 Dwight Casimere with Stacy Keach on Opening Night at the Goodman

The esteemed television, stage and film giant Stacy Keach's onstage transformation into that giant of the literary world, Ernest Hemingway, in Goodman Theatre's World Premiere production of Jim McGrath's play Pamplona, directed by Goodman Artistic Director Robert Falls, is a miracle to behold. Originally scheduled for last spring's season, Keach had to bow out following 11 preview performances after suffering an onstage seizure on opening night. Those who attended this season's opening were richly rewarded for their wait, for Keach delivered a performance of monumental proportion.

The play takes place with Keach pacing the confines of a rundown hotel room in Pamploina Spain like a caged animal, in a set crafted with creative genius by Set Designer Kevin Depinet. Faced with a looming deadline to write a magazine article on a duel between two famous bullfighters, Hemingway is facing the twin demons of writer's block and deep personal depression. Just a few years on the heels of winning the Nobel Prize for Literature, the famous writer finds himself at a dead end. Fighting desperately to get past the opening line of his article, writing and re-writing the words until they almost become a mantra to failure. The bullfight becomes a metaphor to Hemingway's deepening dilemma. 

Keach is in top form, conveying the writer's inner turmoil with subtle changes in his rich, booming voice and gestures that alternately convey explosive emotional fury and surrendering weakness. His character, for example, plays a continual game of cat and mouse with the front desk, begging to have a bottle of whiskey sent up after telling the clerk to ignore the request at all costs. Projection design by Adam Fleming masterfully weaves in a backdrop of projected images that punctuate the writer's narrative with images of his parents, influences such as Gertrude Stein and episodes of the war that molded his legendary pesona and shaped his psyche. The Original Music and Soundscape by Michael Roth also further advances the emotional progression of the play to its climax.

Pamplona is a masterpiece of modern stagecraft. This is an opportunity to see a multi-media legend at the pinnacle of performance in a vehicle that seemed to have been written just for him. Go see it. For information, visit GoodmanTheatre.org.

BROADWAY IN CHICAGO WAITRESS A FROTHY, TASTY LEMON MERINGUE PIE THROUGH JULY 22

by Dwight Casimere

As heartwarming as a generous slice of Apple Pie and as soul-satisfying and easy-to-digest as a hunk of Lemon Meringue, the musical Waitress, now through July 22 at the Cadillac Palace is a delightful mix of stagecraft and musical alchemy that joyfully explores the triumph of the human spirit over seemingly insurmountable adversity. 

As effervescent Desi Oakley (Broadway's Wicked Les Miserables, Annie) portrays the indefatigable waitress and would-be national pie contest contestant with her quirky recipes for "My Husband Is A Jerk" Chicken Pot Pie and Betrayed By My Eggs, among others, she hopes to somehow extricate herself from her abusive marriage and the confines of a small town roadside diner through sheer will and true grit and a super-imaginative set of recipes. The entire enterprise is moved swiftly along by an imaginative book Jessie Nelson and music and  lyrics by Sara Bareilles and directed by Diane Paulus. With a whimsical set by Scott Pask and an on-stage band with Conductor/Pianist Nadia DiGiallonardo at the helm which at times telegraphs the emotional underpinnings of the scenes, the production goes down as easily as a slice of Chocolate Chiffon. Based on the late Adrienne Shelly's 2007 film of the same name, the musical was heralded as Broadway's first with an all-female creative team. The biting subject matter, tempered with a healthy dose of heart-warming sentiment is a recipe that others would be wise to follow for a truly great evening of theatre.

Jenna's desire to enter an upcoming national pie contest with a $20,000 prize that will spring her from the clutches of her abusive husband Earl, played with unabashed bravado by Nick Bailey (Broadway's Casa Valentina, Off-Broadway's Hit The Wall). He delivers the evening's most heartfelt ballad "You Will Still Be Mine." The whole thing  is compounded by the fact that she's pregnant, the result of a drunken night of passion.

Jenna's aspirations are bolstered by the emotional support of a gutsy pair of co-workers Becky, sung by Charity Angel Dawson, who originated the role in Cambridge, and Dawn (Lenne Klingaman) and a too-cool-for-himself line cook Cal, played with terrific comedic timing by Ryan G. Dunkin (The Buddy Holly Story, Cheers:Live On Stage National Tours). Perhaps the single most animated and hilarious character, with his angular balletic moves, is the character Ogie (Jeremy Morse-American Rep Waitress) who lends his bad impromptu poetry and love of Revolutionary War re-enactments to the heady mix. 

Bryan Fenkart (Broadway's Memphis) is her uneasy love interest, her gynecologist, Dr. Pomatter, who has all the warmth of a cold metal medical probe. Broadway veteran and Helen Hayes and Jeff Award winner Larry Marshall lends his considerable theistic chops to the role of Joe.

The music in Waitress is a refreshing mix of rock, country and some uptempo numbers that bend musical genres,  enough to keep your ears perked throughout. The solid message is that, like a recipe for a good pie, we're all a variation of the basic mix of flour, sugar, and butter that life somehow blends, folds and tempers through baking in the crucible of life experience. The outcome is partly in our own hands and partly in our openness to experience life's unexpected benefits and surprises. 

GOODMAN THEATRE SUPPORT GROUP FOR MEN-NOW THRU JULY 29

CHICAGO PLAYWRIGHT RETURNS TO CHICAGO AFTER TV SHOW SUCCESS TO DELIVER A BLOCKBUSTER PLAY ON MALE IDENTITY IN THE #METOO GENERATION

by  Dwight Casimere

It starts with a quartet of Chicago guys from  varying backgrounds sipping Rose wine in an apartment above a noisy bar on the border of Wrigleyville and Boy's Town on Chicago's near north side. One of them, Delano (Anthony Irons-Goodman-Two Trains Running, Congo Square Ensemble), is the only African American in the group, whose wife left him for the evening to do the house cleaning while she went to the Women's March. You can already see where this is going. Roger (Goodman veteran Keith Kupferer-God of Carnage, High Holidays), is a construction worker who spends his days cleaning "The Bean" in Millennium Park. Alex/Allejandro (Chicago veteran Jeff Kurysz ) is the lone Hispanic in the group. He, of the ambivalent sexual proclivity, becomes the catalyst to a series of events that pushes the boundaries of the group's gum and spit cohesiveness. Brian (Ryan Ritley-Goodman-Objects in the Mirror) is the lynchpin and organizer of the group which is a male bonding group which meets every Thursday evening. Brian, at 51, is the oldest "Genius" working at the downtown Apple support store. The sole intent is to provide the men with a safe place to unburden their fears, triumphs, failures and foibles. Men, historically, are reluctant to talk about their feelings. Its almost a genetic trait that comes with the territory. So Brian's idea was to lend his apartment every week to the exercise. Its based on a loosely fabricated Native American ritual kindred to the smoking lodge. A 'talking stick' is fashioned from an old baseball bat wrapped in pucca shells and some random fake Indian symbols. The possessor of the stick is deemed free to talk about whatever comes into his mind, followed by some meaningless whoops and chest beating, reminiscent of a Boy Scout troop around a campfire. The only hint of authenticity here is that Roger claims to be 1/16th or 1/32nd Iroquois, although he has little, if anything, in the way of factual information to support the claim.

What ensues in Chicago playwright Ellen Fairy's rollicking take on male existence in the #metoo environment is one of the funniest plays you'll see all season here, or anywhere else. Fairy was an unknown local playwright in 2009, when her play "Graceland" opened at the now-defunct Profiles Theatre in Chicago. The play garnered rave reviews and quickly moved to Broadway where she in turn got tapped as a writer for some of TVs top shows; Showtimes "Nurse Jackie" and "Masters of Sex," to name a few.

In "Support Group" A bar fight breaks out in the street outside the bar below the apartment and a woman (so they think) is attacked by a group of drunken patrons. The group swings into action with shouts and threats to call the police. Roger is the only one who makes a decisiver, if unpopular move, that drives the mob away. Another sighting is an unidentified woman (they think) performing a sex act on a man in a nearby alley. Enter Kevin (Tommy Rivera-Vega-Goodman-Lottery Day, Mother Road) a closet cross-dresser who has a disastrous coming-out, who hides in Brian's closet to evade police capture (Officer Novak-Goodman veteran Eric Slater, and Officer Caruso-Goodman Theatre-two seasons of Christmas Carol). It turns out he was the person being beaten by the mob. Wearing a red wig and an ill-fitting dress, he makes a weird, if unwelcome addition to the support group. It turns out that he may be its most meaningful element.

Of all the characters, Roger, the middle-aged "Bean" polisher, is perhaps the best developed. I'd bet anything that his character is based on the playwright's father. We later learn that he was the unsuspecting victim of a sudden vertigo attack who is assigned the purgatory of polishing "The Bean" after a lifetime career of building such icons as the Hancock, Sears (now Willits) , and (unfortunately) Trump Towers. The group, and a late-night personal encounter with cross-dressing Kevin, brings him to an epiphany that is the play's denouement.

For the play to have been written by a woman, it shows remarkable insight into the psyche of a group of men approaching middle age, who are grappling with the tenuous threads of interpersonal relations, sexual identity and the 'mastodon effect' of facing emotional extinction and social/sexual irrelevance in a changing world of gender crisis. Support Group for Men will have you laughing your head off. It will also leave you scratching your scalp pondering the thorny issues that it throws in your face in an overwhelmingly entertaining manner. For tickets and information, visit GoodmanTheatre.org.