'Macbeth' actor got theater bug locally

Palatine native Nick Mikula, who stars as Malcolm in the production of "Macbeth" at the Atheneum in Chicago, got the theater bug as a freshman at William Fremd High School.

"A couple of my friends were trying out for a play," he says, "and I decided to go along. I was cast."

The play was about the White Rose, a secret German society that attempted to assassinate Adolph Hitler during World War II. Most of the conspirators paid for their involvement with their lives.

"It was a dark play," Mikula says, "but it was fun and I just got hooked."

Hooked, yes, but he didn't really take it seriously as something he could do for a living.

"It was just playing around and pretending," he says.

Mikula liked theater so much he helped found a small theater company with his high school friends, Theater Nebula, that performed in the summer at the Cutting Hall in downtown Palatine.

But then he went to college and Mikula made plans for his life that did not involve theater.

He planned to become a teacher, an English teacher to be exact, and the place he decided to study was Illinois State University at Normal, a school founded to train teachers. But as the fates would have it Mikula decided to try out for an improv troupe his freshman year.

He got in and his commitment to theater deepened. He switched his major from education to theater. ISU also happens to have a first-class theater program, as you might expect from the alma mater of many of the most famous Steppenwolf folks, plus a host of other local and national theater and film luminaries.

"If I thought I was hooked in high school," Mikula says, "I got even more hooked in college."

When he graduated from ISU a year ago Mikula moved back to Palatine, but there was no question where he would look for work.

"I started auditioning immediately," he says, "And I sent out my head shots."

His first show in Chicago, a production of the comedy "The Dining Room," was nominated for a Jeff Citation for ensemble work. Macbeth is his second major role in Chicago.

"It is a very fun show to do," Mikula says of one of the tightest, shortest and bloodiest of Shakespeare's tragedies. In the play, Macbeth pretty much kills his way to the top, becoming king of Scotland by slaying everyone in his path, before succumbing to his own greed, pride and hubris.

"It is amazing how quickly the world of the play falls apart," Mikula says, "By the end of the second act (the previous king) Duncan is dead. And it just goes on from there."

Mikula plays one of the "good guys' in the play, Duncan's son Malcolm, the rightful heir to the throne. He makes no secret of the fact that he loves speaking Shakespeare's English night after night.

"That language is so addictive," he says, "There are so many great lines I get to speak. Here is one: I think our country sinks beneath the yoke; It weeps, it bleeds; and each new day a gash is added to her wounds."

As he speaks these timeless words, savoring each syllable, you can tell this is a man who loves his work.

Macbeth runs through May 25 at the Athenaeum Theater, 2936 N. Southport, Chicago. For tickets and show times: (312) 902-1500 or www.greasyjoan.org.