Here is the difference a few extra travel-expense dollars can make when it comes to how Chicago theater critics tackle big-ticket shows.
“It looks like you’re at a show the same night in both cities,” he says, “but essentially with [the opening night of] a Broadway show you’ll be able to see any one of the three to five preceding performances, and everybody holds their review. So you can whip back, get to a Chicago show the same night [as opening night in New York]. With Chicago shows, if you say ‘can I come to a preview?’ usually they say yes in the end but they’re never pleased, and I try to avoid it.”
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A recent column found Jones drawing a comparison between General David Petraeus and Othello for having thrown away a distinguished career in a fit of irrational passion. Jones didn’t leave it at that. Given the secondary roles played in the Petraeus drama—not only by Paula Broadwell but also by Jill Kelley, her twin sister Natalie Khawam, and General John Allen—perhaps a better Shakespearean touchstone, Jones mused, was A Comedy of Errors, where the apt question is raised, “How many fond fools serve mad jealousy?”
And if Chicago opinion is essentially Chris Jones’s opinion, his job at the Tribune becomes that much more secure.
To make matters worse, the Tribune expects Jones to cover the drama beat—something New York Times critics don’t do. “To report you have to have sources,” Jones explains. “So you have to get relatively close to people. And at other times you’re reviewing their shows.” Avoiding that conflict is more virtue than the Tribune can afford.
