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Teatro Luna finishes its current 16th Street production, S-E-X-Oh! The Remix, this weekend. Then comes the Words in Motion Festival, consisting of three autobiographical performance pieces running in repertory. Unveiled, a solo show about women in Islam, follows. And in July Filmer will revive The Last Barbecue, by her old buddy Brett Neveu, using the original cast from its 2000 premiere production with the Aardvark. After only one year, 16th Street Theater is an indispensable part of Berwyn’s cultural fabric—and a destination for anyone interested in checking out new voices in a warm, intimate environment. aTeatro Luna’s S-E-X-Oh! The Remix runs through 3/29: Thu-Fri 7:30 PM, Sat 5 and 8 PM, Sun 5 PM. The Words in Motion Festival opens Thu 4/2 and runs through 4/25: Thu-Fri 7:30 PM, Sat 5 and 8 PM. Berwyn Cultural Center, 6420 16th, Berwyn, 708-795-6704, 16thstreettheater.org, all shows $16. —Kerry Reid
&Our readers’ choiceThe New Colony
&Our readers’ choiceXanadu
Founded by the Serbian husband-and-wife team of Natasha and Zeljko Djukic, TUTA (an acronym for The Utopian Theatre Asylum) has been producing in Chicago since 2002. But they didn’t really distinguish themselves from the rest of the off-Loop crowd until their 2006 staging of Ugljesa Sajtinac’s Huddersfield, a Mike Leigh-esque portrait of disaffected post-Soviet Serbian youth. That exquisitely acted show—about a half-dozen twentysomethings wasting long, drunken days in a cramped apartment—featured all the in-your-face excess Chicago actors love. After TUTA’s equally excessive follow-up, Tracks, in 2007, it was hard to imagine this troupe handling Chekhov’s static masterpiece, in which a disgruntled group of friends and relations, stranded on a provincial estate, do almost nothing for three acts but nurse unrealistic romantic dreams and regret missed opportunities for making them come true. But director Zeljko Djukic assembled a near-perfect cast who found suspense, heartache, and absurdity in Uncle Vanya‘s subtle orchestration of nonevents. Like European Repertory’s mesmerizing Ivanov from a decade ago, TUTA’s restrained, elegant production revealed how melancholy gnaws at the human heart. aTUTA revives Uncle Vanya this spring. Opens Fri 5/22. Through 6/28: Thu-Sat 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Chopin Theatre, 1543 W. Division, 847-217-0691, tuta-theatre.org, $25. —Justin Hayford
rThe Reader’s ChoiceMark Chrisler
