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Mar 22, 2024 – 1:55 pm

Interview: With Anthony Freud’s announcement that he will depart the Lyric Opera of Chicago as its general director in July of this year, a significant transition in one of the Windy City’s leading arts institutions is upon us. “I feel great about the company, the strength of the institution from which I’m retiring,” said Freud at a recent sit-down interview in his office on the fourth floor of the Lyric Opera House. “I’m proud of the way we have evolved through challenging times. I think the work that we do is exciting, thought-provoking, innovative, and surprising in many ways.”

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Chicago Wine Journal

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Five Brunello snapshots from Poggio Antico

Apr 23, 2015 – 8:45 am
Poggio-Antico-label 340 plus

Tasting Report: With a group of friends, I recently ventured through five vintages of Brunello di Montalcino from Poggio Antico, an excellent producer of this patrician wine from central Tuscany. The results were intriguing. Younger wines sometimes proved more readily drinkable than older ones, and comparative qualities changed – radically in some instances — as the wines aerated after pouring.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: To sip, to explore, perchance slowly to collect

Apr 23, 2015 – 8:30 am
Three different versions of Merlot

Mulling Wine: For many years, and by now many years ago, I wrote for various national publications about consumer electronics – sound systems, televisions. The advent of larger-screen televisions came to mind as I was pondering a column on venturing into – and inevitably collecting – wine.

‘Martyr’ at Steep: Shrinking from sex, fearful youth finds a hideout, if not shelter, in Bible

Apr 18, 2015 – 12:08 am
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Review: When we first encounter Benjamin Südel, he is a moody teen in the middle of his violent spring awakening. Awkward and obsessed with himself, he is almost paralyzed with bewilderment – no, terror – as he is thrust into his school’s hormonal stew. He may or may not be the title character of Marius von Mayenburg’s play, “Martyr,” now enjoying nervous laughter in its fine U.S. premiere at Steep Theatre. ★★★★

‘The Herd’ at Steppenwolf: It’s Dad at the door, but it could be the wolf – he’s so not welcome

Apr 17, 2015 – 11:28 am
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Review: Ah, family values. Mom, Dad, the kids. The dysfunction, the divorce, the alienation, the animosity. All the things that make a house a home are piled into “The Herd,” a smashing first play by Rory Kinnear now fuming through its U.S. premiere at Steppenwolf Theatre. No need to equivocate. It is simply not to be missed. ★★★★★

Role Playing: Hollis Resnik felt personal bond with zealous, skeptical scholar in ‘Good Book’

Apr 16, 2015 – 4:26 pm
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Interview: As a veteran actress, Hollis Resnik feels a deep connection with Miriam, the biblical scholar she plays in “The Good Book” at Court Theatre. That commonality, says Resnik, is passion.

Bernard Haitink, venerable master of Mahler, reveled in wonders of Seventh Symphony with CSO

Apr 16, 2015 – 10:54 am
CSO-Mahler

Review: Not only with respect to age is Bernard Haitink, at 86, the eminence grise among Mahler conductors today. His association with Mahler’s symphonies is as close and authoritative as it is long. That profound perspective was again evident on April 9 when Haitink led a poetic excursion through the Seventh Symphony with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

‘Carousel’ at Lyric Opera: The stars shine in this merry-go-round. Steven Pasquale is Billy Bigelow

Apr 13, 2015 – 2:45 pm
Lyric Opera of Chicago 'Carousel' with Laura Osnes and Steven Pasquale 2015. (Todd Rosenberg)

Review: The opening of this “Carousel” has everything going for it as the new Rob Ashford production lays out in the plainest way possible what a high-stakes risk your average small town takes when the traveling circus rolls in. Handsome carney barker Billy Bigelow – every father’s nightmare – and scantily clad carnival owner Mrs. Mullin step out from her trailer together for a mutual smoke, and in those first raw minutes the best aspects of this effort are on display. ★★★

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Cristom captures Willamette’s Pinot mystique

Apr 13, 2015 – 2:39 pm
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Tasting Report: In the comparatively brief time since Oregon’s Willamette Valley was established as an American Viticultural Area (AVA), in 1984, the region has won a reputation, especially for its Pinot Noir, that borders on legendary. Over the last couple of days, I’ve been savoring a wine from Cristom Vineyards that illustrates in classic terms the basis of the mystique of northwestern Oregon.

Role Playing: A.C. Smith is ready undertaker, lord of diner world in ‘Two Trains Running’

Apr 9, 2015 – 10:04 pm
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Interview: A.C. Smith, a big-framed actor formidably attired in black as a wealthy undertaker, is ensconced Buddha-like at the corner table of a diner in the Goodman Theatre production of August Wilson’s “Two Trains Running.” Simply learning how to sit there, and figuring out what to do with his unnaturally gloved hands, says Smith, was a daunting new wrinkle even for a savvy veteran of Wilson’s plays.

‘Balm in Gilead’ at Griffin: In one desolate corner of society, hope has a fresh face and short life

Apr 8, 2015 – 4:19 pm
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Review: The vibe might be described as frenetic inertia. At this 1960s New York City café, the locale of Lanford Wilson’s play “Balm in Gilead,” drug pushers and drug users, prostitutes and assorted other low-lifes and lost souls convene, or perhaps the word is collide, in an ever-simmering froth of collective despair. It’s a youthful scene, yet emptiness and delusion form a vista of concentrated sadness, and it is etched deeply into Griffin Theatre’s production. ★★★★

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: If it smells like a wet pooch, dump that puppy

Apr 8, 2015 – 7:50 am
This is what the smell of 'corked' wine looks like.

Mulling Wine: When you put your nose into a glass of wine and get an “off” smell, something more suggestive of a wet dog than fruit, chances are you’re holding a corked wine. If you think that first whiff is bad, just wait 20 minutes. It only gets worse. Before elaborating on what “corked” is, let’s get straight what it is not. It is not bits of cork floating around in your glass.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Two delicious Merlots defy curse of ‘that film’

Apr 5, 2015 – 10:23 pm
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Tasting Report: Can there be any wine enthusiast for whom mere mention of the word Merlot does not invoke the 2004 buddy movie “Sideways” — and the maniacal aversion to the stuff spouted by one of those guysi? In fact, many a pleasurable glass of Merlot continues to flow from California producers in the heartland of Napa and Sonoma. Two charming expressions of this maligned grape are the subjects at hand — Clos du Val’s Napa Valley Merlot and Ferrari-Carano’s Sonoma County Merlot, both from the 2011 vintage.

‘Genius’ at Profiles: Grappling with magical thinking and the harder part of being human

Apr 5, 2015 – 9:56 pm
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Review: The mystery of genius and the frailty of ego may only appear to be separate subjects. They fuse in complicated and absorbing ways in Kate Walbert’s deftly written new play “Genius” at Profiles Theatre – a world premiere that well may be Chicago’s theatrical sleeper of the season. ★★★★

‘The Good Book’ at Court: Rethinking the Bible as the work of men, and struggling to see light

Apr 2, 2015 – 11:58 pm

Review: It ain’t necessarily so, says Miriam with scholarly conviction and a defiant flourish of the Good Book. The Bible, she says flatly, is not the word of God. How it might have been pieced together and how its powerful text touches the lives of two contemporary souls – this scholar and a devout teenage boy struggling with his sexual awakening – is the stuff of “The Good Book,” a brilliantly funny and provocative new play by Denis O’Hare and Lisa Peterson now in its world premiere run at Court Theatre. ★★★★★

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Fire up the grill, and savor these Zin zingers

Apr 2, 2015 – 10:32 pm
Cline's Big Break Vineyard 2012 Zinfandel is luscious and grand.

Tasting Report: The California producers of red Zinfandel are many and scattered, and their styles are wide ranging, as exemplified by two in hand from the 2012 vintage: Cline Family Cellars’ Contra Costa County Big Break Vineyard Zinfandel and Seghesio Family Vineyards’ Sonoma County Old Vine Zinfandel.

Role Playing: Lia D. Mortensen’s intense portrait of a mentally failing scientist holds mirror to life

Mar 29, 2015 – 9:41 pm
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Interview: A very hard personal experience helped actress Lia D. Mortensen get into the skin of the brilliant scientist she portrays in Sharr White’s play “The Other Place” at Profiles Theatre. She had watched her father, Dale T. Mortensen, winner of the 2010 Nobel Prize in economic sciences, suffer the mentally eroding effects of brain cancer, which took his life.

Conductor Edo de Waart, in a hero’s return, guides CSO to the classical heart of Brahms

Mar 29, 2015 – 9:40 pm
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Review: It was a little more than two years ago, with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra gearing up for a major Asia tour, that Dutch conductor Edo de Waart stepped in for ailing music director Riccardo Muti to lead a ringing performance of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 3 (“Eroica”). He subbed again last season for Vladimir Jurowski. On March 26 and 28 he was back on the CSO podium for scheduled concerts featuring Brahms’ Symphony No. 3. The result was a finely wrought performance that showcased the orchestra at its patrician best.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Want to make those glasses shine? Try soap

Mar 29, 2015 – 9:39 pm
A vertical drying rank allows a rinsed decanter to drain thoroughly.

Mulling Wine: There’s something about wine and its enjoyment that elicits a good deal of nonsense, silly notions and wacky practices. The idea that dish soap should never touch a wine glass ranks high on that list. The only way I know to make a glass glisten is to wash it, by hand and with the same liquid detergent I use on my prized kitchen cutlery and fragile table ware.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: From a Burgundian sweet spot, bargain white

Mar 29, 2015 – 9:38 pm

Tasting Report: The Chardonnay produced in the principal appellations of Burgundy has long laid legitimate claim to being, collectively, the finest white wine in the world. But as those celebrated whites have become expensive, now would be a perfect time to consider the white wines from Burgundy’s deep south – from the appellation of Pouilly-Fuissé. The 2013 vintage from Louis Jadot typifies one of the world’s best wine values.

Chen leads Chicago Sinfonietta, vocal forces through exuberant, sensual ‘Carmina Burana’

Mar 24, 2015 – 9:56 pm
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Review: The singular community spirit of Chicago Sinfonietta was on proud display March 23 at Orchestra Hall in a stylish, disciplined and roundly entertaining performance of Orff’s “Carmina Burana” conducted by the organization’s music director, Mei-Ann Chen. Featured with Chen’s chamber-size ensemble were two Chicago choruses, both prepared to a fare-thee-well: the choir of Roosevelt University’s Chicago College of Performing Arts and the Anima Young Singers of Greater Chicago.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Beau-Séjour Bécot, royalty of the Right Bank

Mar 24, 2015 – 9:24 pm

Tasting Report: At any tasting of the great wines of Bordeaux, the stars don’t merely come out – they shower. So it was at a recent sipping of a small but widely representative sampler that produced one heady delight after another. The megastar of this assortment was the seductively opulent Château Beau-Séjour Bécot 2009 from St.-Emilion on Bordeaux’s Right (or east) Bank.

Chicago Bach Choir’s vivid ‘St. John Passion’ was forged from the stuff of lasting memories

Mar 23, 2015 – 3:40 pm
John Nelson conducted the Chicago Bach Choir and Orchestra in the 'St. John Passion.' (EElan Photography)

Review: One can come away from a profoundly affecting musical experience with any number of dominant feelings: enlightenment, exaltation, transcendence, solemnity among them. After hearing the Chicago Bach Choir and Orchestra perform its namesake’s “St. John Passion,” I walked out into the brisk spring night air with a singular sense of privilege. The performance conducted by John Nelson on March 20 at the Harris Theater surely belongs among the concerts that will endure in memory.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Decanting can put blush back in an old bottle

Mar 23, 2015 – 3:39 pm
Wine-filled decanters add to a dinner party's festive mood.

Mulling Wine: To decant or not to decant? To my mind, that isn’t even a question. Any wine, new or very old, gains from time in a decanter. Long experience has taught me that wines that have rested years or even decades in my cellar invariably blossom after the aeration that comes with decanting.

Prelude to a fête française: CSO concert fare anticipates big Gallic do, or has it started?

Mar 22, 2015 – 9:38 pm
Cellist Yo-Yo Ma with the Chicago Symphony 3-19-2015 (Todd Rosenberg)

Review: Although it was not billed as such, the March 19-21 concerts of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra featuring cellist Yo-Yo Ma and conductor Charles Dutoit made it seem as if the French-focus “Reveries and Passions” festival, coming in May and June at Symphony Center, is already underway. Allons-y!

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Raising a grand glass to the Rhône’s Rasteau

Mar 22, 2015 – 9:23 pm
Domaine Brusset's vineyards in Gigondas.

Tasting Report: The Southern Rhône Valley village of Rasteau, which was officially promoted to its own appellation in 2010, doubtless lags in name recognition behind regional fixtures like Gigondas and Vacqueyras. Its merit, however, could hardly be spelled out more clearly than in Domaine Les Aphillanthes’ 2012 Rasteau “1921.”

‘Two Trains Running’ at Goodman: As tumult besets their world, diner denizens grasp at life

Mar 20, 2015 – 12:09 am
Holloway (Alfred H. Wilson) brings a philosophical calm to the diner run by Memphis (Terry Bellamy). (Liz Lauren)

Review: We need a new word to describe the quality that makes every August Wilson play a red-letter event of any theater season. This single new descriptor would meld the two features that Wilson always mixes with such ineffable ease: charm and poignancy. They are the stuff of “Two Trains Running” at the Goodman Theatre, a beguiling portrait of the human condition as an uphill battle – and the difference a leap of faith can make. ★★★★★

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Argentina Malbec, native and Bordeaux-style

Mar 19, 2015 – 11:15 pm
The Clos de los Siete 2011 offers a plush variation on Bordeaux-style blending.

Tasting Report: It wasn’t so long ago that Malbec was known – to the extent that it was in the consciousness of wine enthusiasts at all – for its modest supporting role in Bordeaux blends. Then Argentina roared into vinous ascendancy, and Malbec became an overnight star. Witness the two wines at hand: Susana Balbo’s unblended Signature Malbec 2012 and what might be called an upside-down Bordeaux blend: Clos de los Siete 2011.

Sophocles with an absurdist suffix: Sideshow makes its doubly daring case for ‘Antigonick’

Mar 15, 2015 – 7:15 pm
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Review: It is a breathtaking coup de théâtre, Sideshow Theatre’s time-altering, mind-bending double take on Anne Carson’s bizarre translation of Sophocles’ classic Greek tragedy “Antigone.” Carson’s free-wheeling spin on the original tosses in anachronistic references along with a sly, straight-faced component of utter nonsense that dares the audience to buy it or even comprehend it. And as if that were not enough, director Jonathan L. Green further flummoxes expectations by reassigning roles across gender. Not once, but twice. ★★★★

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: The too-fine point of the 100-point rating game

Mar 15, 2015 – 6:14 pm
The 100-point scoring system makes implausibly fine distinctions among high-quality wines. (2)

Mulling Wine: Reviews in Chicago Wine Journal do not come with numbers. I see only two purposes in reducing a review to a double-digit Post-It note, and neither of them has anything to do with enlightening the reader, the consumer. Numerical inscriptions lend the inscriber a certain pontifical authority: “I declare this a 90-point wine. Go forth, and purchase it with confidence.” The other talking point for scoring wine is exactly that: a point-of-sale flag that essentially does the salesman’s job for him. “This one got 90 points!” It’s no longer even necessary to name the scorer.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Ruinart brut puts fresh zest in classic bottles

Mar 14, 2015 – 11:20 am
A.R. Lenoble's Rose 'Terroirs' Brut  has springtime in its froth.

Tasting Report: There’s a charming paradox in the exuberant freshness of Ruinart’s Brut Blanc de Blancs Champagne. It comes from the oldest house of Champagne, a continuous producer since 1729. This lovely sparkler, alluringly presented in an 18th-century-style clear, bulbous bottle, offers an exhilarating flavor blend of steely citrus and brioche, with a mousse so generous and constant that it seems to be fed by some unseen source.