“A Shayna Maidel” ✭✭✭✭
Barbara Lebow’s 1980s play “A Shayna Maidel” is a much richer work than I ever realized, especially in director Vanessa Stalling’s exquisitely acted production at TimeLine Theatre. On its face, this is a simple story of the reconciliation of a father and his two Jewish, Polish-born sisters, one of whom survived a concentration camp, the other who escaped the Holocaust and came to America. But you don’t escape anything, of course. Stalling focuses intensely on the contrast between the sisters, the Americanized Rose (Bri Sudia) and the newly arrived Lusia (Emily Berman), whose arm carries a telling numerical tattoo. And her production never resorts to excessive sentiment or easy choices. Through Dec. 2 at TimeLine Theatre, 615 W. Wellington Ave.; $40-$54 at 773-281-8463 or timelinetheatre.com
“Avenue Q” ✭✭✭ 1/2
“Avenue Q” is once again a long-running hit in Chicago. “Warning, puppet sex” once again appears on the Mercury Theater’s marquee on Southport. Director L. Walter Stearns’ production has been extended all the way through November; he’s letting Princeton, Kate Monster, Gary Coleman, Christmas Eve and the rest of the gang in the show by Jeff Whitty, with music by Jeff Marx and Robert Lopez, run on and on and on. On a Wednesday night, the main floor of the Mercury was packed and the show warmly received. Jackson Evans, a terrific Princeton, and Leah Morrow, as meticulously fabulous a Kate Monster as there ever has been, both got standing ovations. Many in the audience, clearly, were seeing this musical for the first time. Open run at Mercury Theater Chicago, 3745 N. Southport Ave.; $35-$65 at www.mercurytheaterchicago.com
“Blue Man Group”
✭✭✭ 1/2
“Blue Man Group” has been playing at Briar Street since 1997, a remarkable run of 20-plus years. There have been only two major overhauls in that time; the latest adds selfie sticks, new music and a livelier finale. I’d argue the Blue Men need a bigger overhaul — they still chomp marshmallows, bang drums and paint up audience members — but this remains a fine gateway for the young into the arts. If you’ve never had the pleasure, go. Open run at the Briar Street Theatre, 3133 N. Halsted St.; $49-$69 at www.ticketmaster.com
“Caroline, or Change” ✭✭✭
Tony Kushner and Jeanine Tesori’s “Caroline, or Change” is a musical about two families in Lake Charles, Louisiana, circa 1963, one Jewish, one African-American, one working for the other. An autobiographical story by Kushner about his childhood, it has always held out hope for the future. But that’s not how it felt at the Den Theatre, when a young and gutsy company called Firebrand Theatre opened its own ambitious production, directed by Lili-Anne Brown and starring Rashada Dawan. This production captures much that is emblematic in this story but is less secure when it comes to evoking the hopeful messiness of our everyday lives. Through Nov. 11 at the Den Theatre, 1331 N. Milwaukee Ave.; $45 at firebrandtheatre.org
“Downstate” ✭✭✭✭
Playwright Bruce Norris’s intellectually rigorous new play will be remembered as one of the more incendiary productions in the history of the Steppenwolf Theatre Company. “Downstate,” which is a co-production with the National Theatre in London and is blisteringly acted under the direction of Pam MacKinnon, dares to ask that audience to gather and debate the not-so-gentle proposition that sex offenders are people too. His play is set entirely in a group home located in an unnamed Illinois community southwest of Joliet. Fred (Francis Guinan) is an aw-shucks piano teacher who abused two of his preadolescent students. Dee (K. Todd Freeman) is a smooth-tongued actor who appeared in a tour of “Peter Pan.” We also get the gut-wrenching testimony of a survivor, Andy (Tim Hopper), who appears at the home looking to confront his abuser. Through Nov. 18 at Steppenwolf Theatre Company, 1650 N. Halsted St.; $20-$99 at 312-335-1650 or www.steppenwolf.org
“Gaslight District” ✭✭✭
The best work in the new Second City e.t.c. Stage revue “Gaslight District” engages at an equal level with the paying customers in the seats. For example, there’s a terrific Uber Pool bit mocking the faux communities that emerge in the traffic-snarling world of shared rides. And cast member Jasbir Singh Vazquez plays a guy who shows up at the offices of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, requesting his own deportation. Vazquez is as good as anyone I’ve seen on the e.t.c. Stage. I wouldn’t say new director Anneliese Toft’s revue is fully secure in its own skin, but it’s funny and knows how to hit hard against soft targets. Open run on the Second City e.t.c. Stage, 1608 N. Wells St. in Piper’s Alley; $21-$48 at 312-337-3992 and www.secondcity.com
“Gypsy” ✭✭✭✭
If you doubt that the passion of one gifted performer can raise the game of an entire young cast, you have not seen E. Faye Butler as Rose in the fabulous new Porchlight Music Theatre production of “Gypsy.” Director Michael Weber has nailed the scenes that matter the most: So intense is the moment June (Aalon Smith) realizes that survival means leaving her mother, so deep is the agony of Daryn Whitney Harrell’s Louise, I swear you’ll stop breathing. Watching Butler, an African-American, play the part for which she clearly has longed merely intensifies the themes of this musical. Through Dec. 29 at the Ruth Page Center for the Arts, 1016 N. Dearborn St.; $34-$61 at 773-777 9884 or www.porchlightmusictheatre.org
“Hamilton” ✭✭✭✭
This heartland “Hamilton” is performed by players mostly younger and less experienced than the original New York cast and is less flashy. But it is more in touch with the fundamental scrappiness of the early years of a rebel colony turned into a spectacular democratic experiment. And in Chicago, a city where theater is founded on truth, it is somehow very much more human and vulnerable. That Chicago-style sensibility is led by Miguel Cervantes, the superb actor in the title role. Open run at CIBC Theatre, 18 W. Monroe St.; $65-$400 at 800-775-2000 or www.broadwayinchicago.com
“In the Canyon” ✭✭✭ 1/2
We fans of Calamity West have long been waiting for that play, the one that propels her talent forward. “In the Canyon,” which matches West with the right kind of humanistic, story-oriented director in Elly Green, is that play, I think. We start in 2007; a young woman (the terrific Liz Sharpe) has just had an abortion and finds little love from her partner or her roommate. By the end of intermission, we’re in 2027 and past abortions mean present subpoenas. Multiple characters come and go in these scenes and they’re not always easy to track, but this is a rush of an Orwellian dystopian drama for progressives. Through Nov. 24 at Broadway Armory Park, 5917 N. Broadway; $5-$25 at www.jackalopetheatre.org
“Private Peaceful” ✭✭✭✭
During World War I, many British soldiers were court martialed and shot by a firing squad. Their crime? Cowardice. “Private Peaceful,” the really beautiful new solo show from Ireland that Pemberley Productions is touring through Chicago, is about that horrible practice. Private Tommo Peaceful (the gifted Irish actor Shane O’Regan) is a provincial English kid of working-class origin. On a nearly empty stage, he recounts his life, from falling quietly in love with his brother’s girl at home to his determination in battle. To their great credit, director Simon Reade and O’Regan somehow make you see all the real Private Peacefuls, shot at dawn for no good reason at all. Through Nov. 11 at the Greenhouse Theater Center, 2257 N. Lincoln Ave.; $40-$45 at 773-404-7336 or www.privatepeacefulusa.com
“Southern Gothic” ✭✭✭✭
A house has been built inside the Windy City Playhouse on Irving Park Road. Not the usual stage set. As you walk into the theater for the play “Southern Gothic” by Leslie Liautaud, you’re asked to enter what looks like a real house, replete with a lime-green kitchen, created by set designer Scott Davis for director David Bell’s production. You and your 27 fellow audience members join four couples, variously loving, scheming, cheating and feuding, whose political and personal travails make up a play set entirely during a fraught dinner party in Ashford, Ga., in 1961. Thanks to this truthful cast, it all works spectacularly well. Through Dec. 9 at the Windy City Playhouse, 3014 W. Irving Park Road; $65-$85 at 773-891-8985 and www.windycityplayhouse.com
“Witch” ✭✭✭
The Faustian myth — wherein some ambitious dude sells his soul to the devil — is one of literature’s most popular themes. In Jen Silverman’s most interesting “Witch,” which has its world premiere at Writers Theatre in Glencoe, Faust becomes Elizabeth, a woman who has an especially strong motivation to sell her soul to the devil, given that everyone in her community already believes her to be a witch. How does the equation change when the Faustian bargain must be made by a woman? The scenes between Audrey Francis (as Elizabeth) and Ryan Hallahan (the devil) are the high points of this lively new play — and, indeed, of director Marti Lyons’ production. Through Dec. 16 at Writers Theatre, 325 Tudor Court, Glencoe; $35-$80 at 847-242-6000 and www.writerstheatre.org
