Review: The Sky Hangs Down Too Close/Lucky Plush

RECOMMENDED
Of his 1924 play “In the Jungle of Cities, ” Bertolt Brecht entreats his audience not to “worry your heads about the motives of the fight, concentrate on the stakes.” Peter Carpenter’s latest creation for Lucky Plush, inspired by Brecht’s Chicago tale of two men locked in battle, dissects the concept of a motivation-less struggle from shifting vantage points. We see the virtuosic ensemble struggle, watch struggle, resist and succumb to physical manipulation. Text—some original, some lifted from the play—add theoretical musings and deconstructive moments that peel away at Carpenter’s multi-layered themes while contributing a marvelous texture to the movement. Carpenter invents a physical language full of nuance and humor, yet we feel immediately fluent. The piece takes place between several rooms, and the installation works beautifully in the Galaxie warehouse space—strikingly so in starker moments, as when one dancer, dressed in a vest and button-down shirt, slithers across the floor in pursuit of a dollar bill; or when another discovers the spontaneous grace of her limbs before awkwardly posing with a self-conscious grin. (Sharon Hoyer)

“The Sky Hangs Down Too Close” runs at The Galaxie, 203 West Barry, June 27-29. Tickets available at luckyplush.com.

Walk Beside Me: A Review of Steppenwolf's "Chlorine Sky" The moving production is author Mahogany L. Browne’s adaptation of her verse novel. Sky, is the thoughtful, athletic, resilient character at the center of this young-adult play.
Close Reading: A Review of The Seldoms' Toolbox @ Twenty at Hyde Park Art Center Carrie Hanson, along with company members Damon Green, Dee Alba and Sarah Gonsiorowski developed dances inspired by the creative practices of sculptor Edra Soto, sound artist Sadie Woods, painter Jackie Kazarian and fiber artist Jacqueline Surdell. Each dancer interviewed and studied the studio practice of their partner.
Turfs Up: The Seldoms Take a Close Look at Two Leafy Greens in GRASS The Seldoms new work explores how turf grass and cannabis have each been commodified, weaponized, and used as moral indicators.
Extremely Gentle and Incredibly Close: Khecari Plays with Proximity and Scale in Vicinity Diptych Dance theater is all about people watching other people in motion. For Jonathan Meyer and Julia Rae Antonick, co-executive directors of Khecari, the stationary bodies are of equal importance to those under the lights. The Khecari founders are interested in not just the eyes and brains in those watching bodies, but what happens to all human organisms in the room…
Take It With You: A Review of Come From Away at Broadway in Chicago Much like the show’s spirit, the cast of this production is an homage to togetherness.
Ritual and Reckoning: A Review of "What to Send Up When It Goes Down" "WTSUWIGD" takes on a wide range of social toxins and portrays an equally wide range of how Black people cope and respond.

Related Stories