, “This play is about a party and all this drama that goes on at the party, right? I thought, the audience has to be literally inside of it. Forget these swivel chairs that aren’t allowing us to get inside of it. They’re keeping us in one place.”opened to rave reviews in 2018 at Windy City Playhouse.
After the COVID shutdown, Windy City Playhouse produced two shows downstairs at Club Petterino’s . Their collaboration with Rick Bayless,there in September 2022. But Rubenstein notes that their production of, didn’t draw much audience at their original home on Irving Park Road. “I thought it was one of our best shows we’ve ever produced,” says Rubenstein.
I ask Rubenstein if she had discussions about crime with other producers downtown, such as the Goodman and the Teatro ZinZanni at the Cambria Hotel around the corner, both of which are still obviously producing. She mentions talking to the Goodman and Broadway in Chicago about security concerns. Rubenstein notes, “They’re bigger organizations. They had more of a reserve than we did.”
But, says Rubenstein, they’re continuing to plan immersive productions, with another one already in the works with Bayless.