From Chicago Tribune, December 30, 1998Magical Stagecraft
Our theater and dance critics ring down the curtain on '98In storefronts and in more sumptuously appointed surroundings, our theater and dance reviewers have endured their share of blown lines and botched plots - but also a goodly share of the magical stagecraft for which Chicago is known. Following are a few of our critics' favorite stage moments from the past year.
Richard Christiansen
- At the end of Goodman Theatre's "Death of a Salesman," Elizabeth Franz, as the grieving Linda Loman, poured out her love for her late husband and then, in a gesture both immensely touching and profoundly shocking, lay down at his graveside, as if sleeping with him for one last time.
- At the official opening of the Ford Center for the Performing Arts/Oriental Theatre, after a rousing series of speeches hailing the event, Donna Bullock stepped forward from the assembled onstage ensemble of "Ragtime" and, in a calm, clear soprano sang, sweetly and movingly, "Bless This House."
- The tiny, newly formed Pendulum Theater Company came out of nowhere to present a delightful, surprising production of "The Quick-Change Room," Nagle Jackson's comic saga of a repertory theater caught in the social and economic changes that are sweeping through Russia.
- Andre De Shields and Ken Primus stopped the show when they set the house rocking while singing and strutting to Duke Ellington's "Rocks in My Bed," in the musical "Play On!"
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