Big Lake, Big City at the Lookingglass Theatre

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This was the show I saw tonight at the Lookingglass theatre. The theatre is celebrating its 25th season right now and it is located in the Chicago Water Works building. Here are some pics.

The picture above is of the Lookingglass Theatre's ensemble. David Schwimmer is near the middle in a white robe, along with an assortment of other Chicago actors. Our second city instructor today explained how Chicago theatre is all based upon ensemble work. If you are unfamiliar with that, it means that each theatre has a core group of actors that helps perform in shows and push the company forward. Below are pictures of the show's set. The show's set represented an amazing variety of location by flying in simple set pieces, rolling them onto the stage, or transitioning existing set pieces into a new formation. Unfortunately it is illegal to film any live theatre because of copyright laws, so you'll just have to take my word on all the scenes that took place in this space. Some of the locations used in this play were: a garden patio @ a restaurant, a host stand, a construction site (the rafters where theatrical lights hung is where one actor spoke from, while the other actor was on the floor), an apartment, a cheap hotel room, a police precinct, a dentist office, a travel agency, a bus stop, a morgue, a park bench, a function where there was a guest speaker + a few more.

Below, I was able to capture a few shots during intermission. You will see how the closet in the above picture transitioned to a bed in the picture below. The bed was the site of a love scene (in the first act and the second), but at the close of the first act a fire has killed two people and their badly burnt corpses are still in the bed below.

The acting was phenomenal. Tonight was the very first preview. A preview is when audiences are allowed in, but in reality the show is still in final rehearsals before the actual opening. It gives actors a chance to hear where audiences are laughing and also an opportunity to fix technical mistakes. The gentleman who did the introduction even stated that at some point an actor may call for line or if there is a mistake the stage manager may stop the show.

There were two really interesting technical elements. A Ferris wheel box dropped from the ceiling at the end and lifted 3 actors into the air during one of the last scenes. Another scene featured a 2 ft. by 5 ft. piece of wood that was lowered out of the ceiling and two actors rode that piece of wood about 10 feet in the air to perform a short scene. They did clip onto a safety harness before lifting into the air. The scene was re-creating a construction site.

The play was a dark comedy in which there were quite a few dead characters by the end. It had elements of film noir and began with a conflict between two brothers. One responsible brother was trying to help out the other because he was family, however the irresponsible brother kept wasting his opportunities to do better. At one point the irresponsible brother told his brother he was sleeping with his brother's wife. He was chased offstage. The next time we saw the irresponsible brother on stage, he had a screwdriver stuck in his head. It was stuck there for the rest of the play.

The play also dealt with a lead detective in the Chicago PD. This detective was married and soon his wife was cheating on him. The wife and her lover, another married man, pretended to be burned alive in a hotel room in order to cheat the married man's wife out of money. The plot is so difficult to follow it would be hard for me to sum it up, but it was very interesting and the actors handled the material well. This was a brand new play and I saw it on the first night audiences were let into the theatre.

It was quite an experience, once again.

 

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