Third Coast Creatives

Chicago theater has long had a reputation for producing some of the best theater in the country.   As a result, Chicago audiences expect a high bar as they enter the theater doors.   Occasionally, audiences are blessed with productions that exceed that bar.   Warp (produced by the Organic Theater), Macbeth (starring Aidan Quinn at Northlight Theater), and True West , Balm in Gilead , and Of Mice and Men (Steppenwolf Theater) are examples Chicago theater productions people continue to talk about years, or even decades, after the lights go down.   Under the direction of Artistic Director Michael Weber, Porchlight Music Theatre kicks off its 25 th season with their production of Sunset Boulevard that may well join the list of special productions that theater aficionados will boast “they were there when…”. Based on the Academy Award winning Billy Wilder Film, Sunset Boulevard features music by Andrew Lloyd Weber with lyrics and book by Don Black and Christo...

For decades, Cole Porter was the toast of Broadway.   With successful shows such as Kiss Me Kate , Anything Goes , and Silk Stockings along with constant flow of hit songs cascading off his keyboard, just having Porter’s name on the marquis was a producer’s dream.   At the urging of producers Cy Feuer and Ernest Martin, Porter agreed to pen the score for a show set in Montmartre in the 1890s.   Written towards the end of his career, Can-Can was Porter’s “poke-in-the-eye” to the censors he felt were holding Broadway back.   With its latest production in its Porchlight Revisits series, Porchlight Music Theatre brings Can-Can , Porter’s irreverent homage to the wicked revelry of Montmartre to Chicago’s Gold Coast’s Ruth Page Center for the Arts for three high kicking performances.   Beginning its fifth year, this special series provides an opportunity for music theatre aficionados to experience musicals that opened on Broadway, but are no longer frequentl...