Surely no words ever written by any theater critic stirred more local buzz than Michael Billington’s 2004 observation in London’s Guardian that “Chicago . . . [is] the current theatre capital of America.” It came like manna from heaven to the denizens of this no longer even second city, and they seized upon it. At last the flyover on the prairie—home to more bustling, inventive, hardscrabble theater than anyplace on earth—was getting its due.
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In the years since Billington penned that magic phrase, it’s never been far from the lips or minds of the Chicago theater community, which adopted it as both vindication and slogan. Now Columbia College is convening an “international congress of theater scholars and practitioners,” a four-day symposium that’ll take a serious look at all of its implications. “Chicago: Theatre Capital of America—Past, Present, Future” runs May 18 through May 21, with 70 sessions and, as of press time, 180 speakers from 68 theaters and 28 colleges. Open to anyone who pays the $95 registration fee ($60 for students), it’ll offer the equivalent of a couple of exceptional graduate seminars for, say, the price of a single ticket to a Broadway in Chicago show.
London’s head is now in his new book, however—a historical look at the “founding visions” of American theater to be published next spring by Theatre Communications Group. In a speech scheduled for Friday, May 20, at 9:30 AM, he’ll outline “at least four really important theater visions that have come out of Chicago,” starting with the multicultural community theater that was part of Hull House in the late 19th century.
E-mail Deanna Isaacs at disaacs@chicagoreader.com.
