When he was nine years old, John Chapman put together a list of life objectives, complete with deadlines for reaching them, and kept it folded up in his wallet from that moment on. By the age of 21, in 1995, he was knocking off items left and right—and on time, too. High school class valedictorian? Check. Class valedictorian at the University of Chicago? Done. Marriage? In the works, with longtime sweetheart Katie. A mergers-and-acquisitions job at Goldman Sachs (because, after all, they’re the biggest bankers in the world)? The interview is set for tomorrow morning, he tells us during the graduation speech that opens Andrew Hinderaker’s beautifully wrought new play, I Am Going to Change the World.
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Given his record to that point, it doesn’t seem out of the question to John that he’ll be able to manage the rest of his goals—including his rise to the corporate pinnacle at Goldman Sachs and his purchase of what was then called Sears Tower, so that he can ensconce his parents in the penthouse there. John’s UC valediction is all about the virtues of overweening ambition. A dream is only dream until you live it, he says, so dream big. Never mind that pious crap about life being worthwhile if you can help just one other person. Plan on helping thousands. Hundreds of thousands. If, say, you’re going to be a doctor, then don’t just see patients. Cure cancer. That’s the sort of thinking that got John to the top of his class, and he’s damned if it won’t take him on to still greater glories.
There seems to be a speculative edge to Hinderaker’s writing. In 2010 the Gift Theatre premiered his Suicide, Incorporated, which posited a start-up business dedicated to providing artful letters of farewell for those who wanted to kill themselves with a literary flourish. I Am Going to Change the World carries a whiff of The Twilight Zone, too, what with the business about the anniversary reaction. Hinderaker might’ve allowed the play to subside into genre cliches out of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde or even the Hulk, who also has his bouts of amnesia. But in Jonathan Berry‘s intensely humane production for Chicago Dramatists, the play opens out instead, resonating with implications concerning the chew-’em-up, spit-’em-out imperatives of American capitalism—from the destruction of communities like Gary (and people like John’s parents) when they lose their industrial anchor to the mania for achievement in an increasingly stratified nation where if you don’t have it all you can’t have enough.
Through 7/1: Thu-Sat 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Chicago Dramatists, 1105 W. Chicago, 312-633-0630, chicagodramatists.org, $15-$32.
