Chicago, 15th U.S. Tour in Austin, November 19 - 24, 2013

by Michael Meigs

An enthusiastic voice behind us as we exited Bass Concert Hall at the University of Texas last night: "That was nothing like the movie!"

Live performance, even in the cavernous space of the Bass, can seize your attention and send your heart racing in ways that no flat screen image ever can. And that's what happens in the 15th (annual?) tour of Chicago, playing in Austin through this coming Sunday.

(Terra C. MacLeod)

The story is familiar and, frankly, banal, a combination of 1920's tabloid sensationalism, some 1930's B-movie styling, and a dose of Cinderella (and I don't mean Disney's Cinderella). Roxy murders her lover and when her big dumb good-hearted husband realizes what happened, he recants his own false impression; she gets sent to the state pen in Joliet, where a different hierarchy rules. Tough women sing in cages (Cell Block Tango) and vie with one another for favors from Mama the warden and from Billy Flynn, the lawyer who'll lie, cheat, misrepresent and do just about anything (except, interestingly, overtly request sexual favors) to earn his colossal fee by obtaining a non-guilty verdict. Tabloid notoriety promises to become celebrity that offers prospects of a career in vaudeville.

(Terra C. MacLeod and cast)

The thrills of this stage version are delivered hot and steaming by the choreography. It's classic Bob Fosse style done for the 1997 original staging by Ann Reinking and meticulously recreated by David Bushman. Muscular, supple and proudly strutting their stuff in revealing costumes, this cast of a dozen dancers astonishes and surprises again and again. The moves are cool, the scenes are fast and full of style, and over the course of the two hours of entertainment you'll have the opportunity to pick your very favorite. The final curtain call brings them on individually with their own names to receive the acclaim of the crowd.

Click to read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .