What’s New

It’s the late-20s existential crisis sitcom that all South Asian American millennials deserve.

Code-Switched is the thoughtfully curated care package only your fellow South Asian friend from high school can make. The one who’s been to your house for chana chaat and also smoked weed in your parent’s garage while they went to prayer.…Read More

Getting back to normal isn’t going to happen. And in many ways, it shouldn’t.

On Monday, March 16, I walked into a theater for the last time in 2020. It was at Theater Wit for their production of Mike Lew’s Teenage Dick, a Richard III-meets-high-school-angst dark comedy-drama.…Read More

Add these stories rooted in the city to your reading list.

Canceled events, publishing delays, shuttered bookstores—in many ways, 2020 was an awful year for Chicago writers.…Read More

Charles Dickens and Ike Holter are unlikely twin spirit guides in two online shows.

“Ring out the old year, ring in the new, ring-a-ding-ding,” says Shirley MacLaine’s Fran Kubelik with weary resignation near the end of The Apartment (still my favorite holiday film, not that you asked). Two streaming shows give us similar lenses for viewing the transition from hellscape to (vaguely) hopeful as this year winds down.…Read More

In a year of loss, artists found momentum and took care.

The view is divided by screens and mirrors in Jane Jerardi’s delicate hold. Fragmentation by the frame creates incomplete views of arms and torsos, close and deliberate.…Read More

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This week’s featured gig poster was designed by the Empty Bottle using a photo illustration by John Sturdy.

Like many recent gig posters of the week, today’s selection isn’t something you’ll see stapled to telephone poles, but we’re happy to highlight it on account of the festive ridiculousness of its photo.…Read More

Frank Garvey, creator of the long-running OmniCircus, also recorded two brilliantly unclassifiable albums in Chicago in the late 70s.

Since 2004 Plastic Crimewave (aka Steve Krakow) has used the Secret History of Chicago Music to shine a light on worthy artists with Chicago ties who’ve been forgotten, underrated, or never noticed in the first place.…Read More

The 150-acre burial ground has served the South Side for over a century. Now, amid a devastating COVID-19 surge and a racially charged clash over funeral processions, it’s become a lightning rod.Read More

A chance purchase at a sidewalk sale leads to a curious obsession.Read More