March 4 - April 3
Storefront Theater

“This is the future” begins this darkly comic fable about urban developers, criminals, law enforcement, and even a witch, all fighting for the soul and vision of a city.  Set in an urban landscape ripe for redevelopment, the parable blends off-kilter characters, fast-paced storytelling, and stinging social satire in a tale of greed, corruption, and civic responsibility. Theatre Mir’s production marks the Chicago professional premiere of this work by George F. Walker, one of Canada’s most prolific and celebrated playwrights.

View photos by John W. Sisson, Jr.

What did you think about the show? Share your comments here.

On Tuesday, February 9, Dr. H. Peter Steeves presented the “The Mourning Show” in the Claudia Cassidy Theater. Despite that harsh winter conditions, over 150 people turned out to explore the relationship between art and mourning with Prof. Steeves.

“The Mourning Show” incorporated a multi-media slide presentation/lecture with live music, dance and theater to focus on the relationships among language, representation, beauty, memory, and grief. Mourning’s work is confronting the death of the Other, and as such it places us in relation to our mortal world and our finite community. Prof. Steeves investigated what this means from a philosophic, scientific, and artistic standpoint, moving from the work of Edward Hopper to Francis Bacon, from William Shakespeare to Donald Hall, from Aristotle to Jacques Derrida—from painting to poetry to physics to philosophy and beyond.

Click here to view photos by John W. Sisson, Jr.

Part memoir, part editorial, all comedy, this is the totally too-good-to-be-true story of an interracial family in Chicago, 1979. Actor/writer James Anthony Zoccoli gives a retrospective account of his life as little Jimmy: a half-Italian, half-Polish kid who thinks he’s all Black when his White mother remarries an African-American man.

What did you think about the show? Share your comments here.

The phrase “Black is Beautiful” was coined by the Abolitionists in America & a century later evolved into a full scale Cultural Movement.

The Last Poets wrote a song called “The White Man’s got a God Complex”

From all the empirical evidence that I had seen in all of my history classes & in the world at large, I couldn’t argue.

But my grandparents went from being borderline racists to downright civil rights activists as our family changed color.

So, when people ask the point of show, I’d have to say that the moral of the story is: “People are all the same on the inside, right?”

But that is not very interesting.

I guess I could have called the show: “People are all the same on the inside, right?”

& I guess I could have opened & closed the show with the statement: “People are all the same on the inside, right?”

But that sort of treatment is not convincing; it is certainly not compelling; and, it is difficult to make that sentiment comical.

It just so happens that one of the objectives of The NAACP is “to remove all barriers of racial discrimination through democratic process”.

Theatre might be the most democratic processes in existence.

An Artist produces a show.  The Public sees the poster, or hears word of mouth, or reads reviews & either goes or does not go.

Unlike television or the radio, you cannot accidentally tune into a play.  Which is why I didn’t just write these stories into a blog or put a video up on Youtube.

I could have even written a screenplay or pitched a situation comedy for television, but I opted to stand on stage & tell my stories the way they are meant to be told: personally.

So, I don’t expect to be able to go out & yell my story on the street corner any more than anybody should shout “Fire!” in a crowded theatre.

I just hope the seats are nice & full; I hope to see you there in the crowd.

CAUCASIAN?  EVANSTONIAN??  AFROPOLSKITALIANO???

By the time I was 8 years old I had lived in Oak Lawn, Orland Park, Matteson, Rogers Park & Hyde Park – with my Polish family & my Italian family – BOTH.

We finally ended up in Evanston, but my head was still spinning.

So, when people asked me, “What are you?” I didn’t know what to say. 

This was partially due to this internal conflict of mine & partially due to my apparent amibuity.  I could identify with anybody, I related to everybody & nobody could tell what I was.  My hair was sorta’ wavy.  My nose was sorta’ big.  My complexion was sorta’ olive.  So, almost everyone I befriended assumed that I was whatever they were – or at least their parents did.

“You are Greek, no?” No, but I love mythology.

“Are you Jewish, yes?” No, but I love Jackie Mason.

“Eh…what you are – Armenian, eh?” No, but I love me some shish kabobs.

In Evanston, there were people from countries I had never even heard of before - & some that sounded downright fictitious.

“Estonia?” You made that up.

“Belize?” Puh-leeze.

“Latvia?” That’s an imaginary comic book place, right?

Plus, there were combinations that I would never have imagined.

Afro-slovakian, for example.

One my best friends in grade school was half-Japanese & half-Irish.

My parents best friends were a Black Man with a Jewish Wife whose children were Blewish.

There was even a kid in who had a father from Israel & a mother from Palestine who was Hebrewstinian.

So, I could have been anything in the world, from anywhere in the world & it wouldn’t have mattered, but all I wanted to be was anything but me.

Identity crisis.

LEFT, RIGHT, LEFT, TOGETHER

“Now I am Jimmy Z & I’d like to say Hello
To the black & the white, the red & the brown, the purple & yellow.
But first…”

If shoes make the man, then mine are Boogie Shoes.

I was hardly born with two left feet, but, even still, it takes patience, pratice & diligence to Get on the Good Foot, like James Brown.

I always loved to dance & sing, but I remember the first time the funk hit my backbone & went straight to my head.

First there was the cowbell, then the bassline, then the synthesized strings & next thing you know…

It was like that moment in The Jerk when Steve Martin’s character Navin R. Johnson is laying in bed - dejected from learning that he was adopted by his Black family & realizing that he’s going to be White forever - & as he starts to eat his Birthday Twinkie while listening to “Music in a Mellow Mood” on the Radio.

“It’s unbelievable. I’ve never heard music like this before. It speaks to me.  Now, watch…”

His toes start to tap, his fingers start to snap, & the beat of the Mantovani Orchestra sweeps him away.

“Well, if this is out there, just think how much more is out there! This is the kind of music that makes me want to go out there & be somebody!!”

The same phenomena occurred with me at the Rainbo Roller Rink in 1979 when I heard Rapper’s Delight by the Sugar Hill Gang.

As soon as I heard it, I threw my hands in the air & started waving them around like I just didn’t care!

For the rest of the year, I walked around goin’, “I said a-hip-hop, the hippie, the-hippie, to the hip-hip-hop, a-ya’ don’t stop, the rock it, to the bang-bang boogie, say up jumped the boogie to the rhythm of the boogie the beat…”

& ever since, I have dug rappin’.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m no rapper.  In fact, I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a whack MC.

But, I do love Hip-Hop music in all its forms - because Hip-Hop IS music in all its forms.

[Rhythm + Blues + Rock + Soul + Disco + Jazz + X + Y + Z = HIP-HOP]

& on top of all that, Hip-Hop was the gateway into a lot of other musical styles for me, personally.  It was an education, even.  My mom listened to Steely Dan, but I didn’t think those guys were that cool until I heard their music sampled by De La Soul.

Don’t get me wrong, I liked Carol King & Kansas just as much I liked Rakim & Boogie Down Productions.

I listened to Electric Light Orchestra & Vicious Beat Posse.  Both.

I liked both XTC AND XClan.

The Doobie Brothers AND The Jungle Brothers.

I did ’The Safety Dance‘ AND ‘The Smerphies Dance’.

I had Kool & the Gang on 8 Track; then, Heavy D & the Boyz on 45 and Bruce Hornsby & the Range on Cassingle.

My eclectic interests made it difficult for me to pick a style, which made it difficult for kids at school to label me & sometimes it even made it difficult for my friends to understand me, too.

Until years later, when Tupac sampled That’s Just the Way It Is for his song Changes.

Then, I was finally able to say: “See y’all?  It told you that song was fresh.”

Play that Funky Music, White Boy.  Let’s Dance.

BOTH.  That is my favorite word.

“Why,” you may ask?  “Is it because of the sound or the meaning?”

& I will tell you, “Both.”

First of all, look at the spelling – B – O – T – H.  Both.

Now say it: “Both.”

Try saying it again, but this time, really slowly: “BUH – OHHH - THHHHH.”

Now, say it ten times fast: “Bothbothbothbothbothbothbothbothbothboth.”

Weird, right?  After a while you start to wonder if it is even a real word.

But, besides the way it looks & sounds, whenever I am confronted with any set of options, it is usually my answer.

“Would you like Soup or salad?” Both.

“Toast or Bagel?” Both, please.

“Chocolate or Vanilla?” Both, thank you.

When my grandparents asked me: “What do you want for Christmas, Jimmy, the Star Wars Action Figures or the Guns of Navaronne Playset.” I, of course, said: “Both.”

When the judge asked: “Do you want to live with your mother or your father?” I answered: “Both.”

When people ask me, “Is your last name pronounced, ‘ZAH-kah-lee’ or ‘TSOH-koh-lee’?” Actually, both.

I’m from Chicago, so people wonder, “South Side or North Side?” The answer: both.

“City or Suburbs?” Truly, both.

“House or Hip-Hop?  Ska or Reggae?” Both of both of those.

“Cubs or White Sox?” Whaddayouthink?

WHAT ARE YOU?

“Half-Italian, half-Polish, all Black.” That’s my joke.

It’s funny ‘cuz it’s true…& truth is stranger than fiction.

As a kid, I was pretty darn funny & pretty darn smart: smart enough to know better than to feel responsible for the fact that my mother & father were divorced when I was three years old; funny enough to be able to keep a sense of humor when times got tough.

If humor is a defense mechanism, I was Bruce Lee in Enter the Dragon and the television was my Shaolin Temple.  His style was Tiger.  Mine was Python.  Monty Python.  My special move would have been the Banana Split.  My impossible mission was to make my family laugh.  I was James Bond in a Tennessee Tuxedo; my drink was a Tom & Jerry.

Though I didn’t know why, I knew at a young age that Chicago was called “The Second City” & I was proud that our town was the birthplace of SCTV.

After the divorce, my mom & I moved from Orland Park to Rogers Park.

We zigged & zagged; South Side to North Side & back again…

Then, my mom married my dad & we moved to Hyde Park.

It was summertime, so with all of the packing & moving & unpacking, there was hardly anything for me to do during the week & few opportunities for me to meet other kids.  So, I spent a lot of time organizing my action figure, comic book & baseball card collections, listening to my portable turntable and watching TV.

ONTV.  Remember ONTV?  It was cable television before cable television had cables.  Every month they premiered a new movie & they would show that movie four times a day.  Every day.  Seriously: 7am; Noon; 7pm; Midnight.  The movie that was ONTV when we first moved in; the movie that I have seen the most ever; the movie that I can pretty confidently say that I have watched more often than any other person in the world (& I wish I had documented it for Guinness Book of World Records eligibility): was The Jerk.

During our first few weeks there, that was all I did: watch The Jerk.  Over and over and over again. Navin R. Johnson was my hero.  He had replaced Luke Skywalker, Jesus, Spiderman and my own grandfather as the person with whom I identified most.  The first line of the film is “It was never easy for me.  I was born a poor black child…”

& I thought, “Rap on, brother.  Rap on.”

DCA Theater’s INCUBATOR process was a wonderful opportunity for Wishbone.  I’ve learned to never underestimate the potential power of a vacant room, in this case DCA’s beautiful Studio Theater. Add an inspiration, a few energetic actors, someone to lead, and you’ve got yourself a play waiting to write itself, so to speak.  But is that really all it takes?  Even with an abundance of ideas to fulfill concept, what happens if the play doesn’t write itself?

It’s an intriguing decision to make before commencing an ensemble-developed piece whether to include a dedicated playwright.  On one hand, you are entrusting just one person to capture the essence of all the ensemble’s research, discussions and improvisational efforts and convert it into a play that ideally the entire group believes in.  On the other hand, without a playwright to absorb and filter what is created in rehearsal, whose responsibility then is it to write?  The director’s?

We faced a similar quandary during Spandex.  While we had very fruitful creative process, ultimately and somewhat unexpectedly, the playwriting role came to me (the director) and Laurie Jones (a member of the acting ensemble).  It became necessary for us to consolidate seven different superhero stories and draft the first three scenes.  With feedback from the acting ensemble, we tweaked and refined the scenes until we had a script we felt happy to present to an audience.  However, looking to the future with Spandex, I would prefer not moving forward without a dedicated playwright.  If anything, to give more clarity to a very free and open-ended process. 

Today marked Wishbone’s last rehearsal for the Incubator Project.  To think that we started the month of January with little more than an idea in our heads and now have a definitive focus, characters, and written scenes (as well as a whole lot more information in our heads about the ins and outs of the superhero uni-oh wait, MULTI-verse) is pretty exciting.

When the idea for this show first came up, it stemmed from a desire to know more about the word of superheroes and their connection to society today.  When developing new work, sometimes it’s hard to narrow down the topic enough. Initially we were interested in every single aspect of the superhero world.  How, for example have politics influenced the creation of superheroes and villains?  Should we explore the religious connotations, the idea of a chosen ‘one’ that exist in so many superhero stories?  What parallels can we draw between American comic book superheroes and the superheroes of other countries?  The amount of information we were able to find was staggering and it was a bit overwhelming to think that we would have to narrow down all these bits and bobs of research and find a common theme.  Our story was in that information pile somewhere, we just had to dig it out.

Now, two weeks later we have found the story we want to explore.  As we delved into the process of creating a play, the relevant pieces of our story began to unearth themselves.  We went from just pages and pages of facts to several ideas to a few themes, to one theme to a question which we asked ourselves over and over again: what superhero do we need today?  Answering that question gave us the fuel we needed to piece together what you will see on Monday the 25th!