Spotlight: Tony-winning tuner ‘Hadestown’ returns to Chicago for a brief run
‘Hadestown’ returns
Singer/songwriter Anaïs Mitchell’s Tony Award-winning recounting of the myth of the poet Orpheus and his beloved Eurydice returns to Chicago for a brief run. The musical tells two love stories: That of Orpheus, who follows his wife into the underworld to attempt to retrieve her, and the story of Hades, king of the underworld, and his wife, Persephone, the goddess of spring, who rules with him part of the year.
7 p.m. Tuesday, May 6 and 13, and Thursday, May 8 and 15; 1 and 7 p.m. Wednesday, May 7 and 14; 7:30 p.m. May 9 and 16; 2 and 7:30 p.m. May 10 and 17; 1 p.m. May 11 and 18, at the CIBC Theatre, 18 W. Monroe St., Chicago. $76.50-$273. broadwayinchicago.com.
New theater premieres new play
Avalanche Theatre makes its Chicago debut with the premiere of “Time is a Color and the Color is Blue” by Chicago playwright Melanie Coffey. Set in an ice cave, the play is about a glaciologist who — after becoming trapped while searching for cave paintings — asks for forgiveness from the earth, from loved ones she’s hurt and from herself.
Previews at 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday, May 2-3, at Bramble Arts Loft, 5545 N. Clark St., Chicago. The show opens Sunday, May 4. Tickets start at $15. avalanchetheatre.com.
Love and robots
City Lit Theater concludes its season with the premiere of “R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots).” “Freely adapted” from the 1920 science-fiction play by Czech writer Karel Čapek, it’s about an eccentric scientist who manufactures artificial human beings who falls in love with an activist who advocates for the rights of the machines.
Previews at 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday, May 2-3 and 9-10, and 3 p.m. Sunday, May 4, at 1020 W. Bryn Mawr Ave., Chicago. The show opens May 11. $30, $35. (773) 293-3682 or citylit.org.
Celebrating the absurd
Edward Albee’s “Zoo Story,” Sam Shepard’s “Action,” Harold Pinter’s “The Dumb Waiter” and a new translation of “The Police” by Slawomir Mrozek are among the short works staged during the Theatre of the Absurd Festival of Darkly Comic Tales co-produced by Gwydion and Chopin theaters. Three shows are on Friday and Saturday and two shows and a lecture are on Sunday.
7 p.m. Friday and Saturday, May 2-3, and 3 p.m. Sunday, May 4, and through May 25 at Chopin Theatre, 1543 W. Division St., Chicago. $25-$45. (773) 278-1500, gwydiontheatre.org or chopintheatre.com.
Red Orchid Chicago premiere
A Russian soldier named Soso is trained by a Stanislavaski Method actor to serve as a body double for Josef Stalin at 1943’s consequential Tehran Conference with Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt in “Six Men Dressed Like Josef Stalin” by Dianne Nora. Dado directs A Red Orchid Theatre’s Chicago premiere, which stars Esteban Andres Cruz as Soso and David Cerda as Koba, the actor who trains him.
Previews at 7 p.m. Thursday and Friday, May 8-9 and 15-16; 3 and 7 p.m. May 10; and 3 p.m. May 11 at 1531 N. Wells St., Chicago. The show opens May 17. $35-$50. (312) 943-8722 or aredorchidtheatre.org.
Portrait of a scientist
Galileo, the seminal 16th-century astronomer who laid the foundation for modern scientific inquiry, is forced to maintain his beliefs (specifically the heliocentric model of the solar system in which the Earth moves around the Sun) and be tried for heresy or accept Church doctrine that the Earth is the center of the universe in Bertolt Brecht’s “Galileo.” Trap Door Theatre stages Charles Laughton’s 1945-1947 translation, starring David Lovejoy as the titular scientist. The production includes nudity.
8 p.m. Thursday through Saturday, May 8-10, and through June 14 at 1655 W. Cortland St., Chicago. $33.55. trapdoortheatre.com.