Running September 13-15, the 13th edition of this annual fall arts festival in Chicago’s Wicker Park/Bucktown area showcases the work of emerging artists in all media–including numerous theater and improv productions, as shown in the following listings. Plays are scheduled at the Chopin Theatre, 1543 W. Division; an “Improv in the Park” series takes place at the northwest entrance to Wicker Park, 1425 N. Damen. (For information on poetry, visual art, film, dance, and musical attractions, see Readings & Lectures, Galleries & Museums, Movies, Dance, and Music listings elsewhere in this issue.)
Wanderlust Productions presents poet Kenneth Patchen’s 1942 radio drama about “a man who attempts to choose poetry over information.” Chopin Theatre, 5 PM.
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Director Nicole Garneau and Big Smith seek to “banish menstrual shame” in this performance piece. “Garneau and the members of Big Smith (Jane Haldiman, Katherine Klein, and Anne Statton) deliver tough and lively drum and vocal performances, and I particularly admired their cunning vocal arrangements of traditional songs like ‘Go Down You Blood Red Roses’ and ‘Red Apple Juice.’ But Bloodrut doesn’t reveal anything about women’s menstrual cycles that hasn’t been broadcast since at least the first appearance of Our Bodies, Ourselves. . . . And using menstruation as a defining marker for feminine experience comes dangerously close to the biological determinism that feminists have fought against forever,” said Reader critic Kerry Reid when she reviewed the show earlier this summer. Chopin Theatre, 6 PM.
Icarus
Robyn Okrant plays a woman seeking a better life through “fabricated reincarnation.” Chopin Theatre, 10 PM.
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 14
2 PM.
