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Conversations featuring authors and influential leaders in the arts, media and business.
As The Joffrey Ballet introduces its 2017/18 season opening with the premiere of Giselle on October 18th, our FTA this week is a memorable conversation with Artistic Director Ashley Wheater this spring. If you did not experience Christopher Wheeldon’s re-imagined The Nutcracker last year, make a reservation today. The Nutcracker returns December 1st.
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When I was growing up in rural Vermont in the early 60's, we had a party line telephone system. Our unique ring was one short and one long, the cue that someone had dialed our number and it was our turn to talk on the line. If you tried to call in when someone was on the phone, you got a busy signal. If you tried to call out, you would sometimes interrupt whoever was talking at the time. Most days, things worked pretty well.
Read MoreIt is a BIG week coming up in and around Chicago for festivals, garden walks, movies and Shakespeare in the Park and some high-flying excitement – namely, Cirque Du Soliel’s Luzia opening July 21st at the United Center.
Read MorePreviews begin this weekend for the Grippo Stage Company's revival of long-time Chicago playwright and actor James Sherman's God Of Issac at the Piven Theatre at Noyes Cultural Arts Center in Evanston. The semi-autobiographical piece centers around a young American Jew searching for his Jewish identity following the threatened 1977 neo-Nazi march in Skokie.
Read MoreFTA CONVERSATIONS with Robert Sims and James Sherman are featured this week along with summertime Chicago events of interest.
Read MoreIf not for a comment by Walter Matthau on the set of Dennis the Menace, Randall Newsome might well be still behind the camera.
Read MoreIn case you were wondering, David Catlin actually grew up in Pittsburgh. At last report, no whales have been sighted in the Ohio River, but that did not deter Catlin’s lifelong fascination with water, the ocean, or, otherwise affect his extraordinary gift for storytelling, all of which intersect in the Lookingglass Theatre’s magnificent production of Herman Melville’s Moby Dick.
Read MoreCelebrate the Fourth of July with CONVERSATIONS this week that will fill your heart and stir your soul. And if all else fails, there is always gin!
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If you are looking for a short, professional cultural diversion on Tuesday nights this summer in Chicago, plan to attend the International Music Foundation's Rush Hour Concerts Series. Now in its 18th season at St. James Cathedral, 65 E. Huron Street, the series runs through August 29, 2017 offering a full range of free, concert programming.
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Our FTA CONVERSATIONS with the superbly talented André De Shields and Matt Crowle are front and center this week. Also a list of Chicago festivals, art and street fairs, concerts, theater plus superb entertainment everywhere at low or no cost. Chicago’s busy theater community is bursting at the seams with talent – musical and otherwise.
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On March 23, 2016, we launched the Conversations series at the Skokie Theatre. We set out to present "a monthly interview series featuring authors and influential leaders in the arts, media and business" with a plan to run for four months with two conversations for each program. As you will hear, our first program, with producer/writer/actor Ron Keaton and writer Ethan Michaeli, was particularly memorable. Our conversations have continued since those early days with now over 30 available on our website at De Usuris and online at iTunes, Stitcher and Libsyn.
This week, we are featuring the conversation with Ron Keaton including a scene from his Jeff Award winning performance of Churchill. We have also reprinted here, for the first time, the opening monologue of the show as this week's De Usuris blog post as a tribute to my friend, the late John Callaway -- proof that the more things change, the more they stay the same. Cheers, ET
Conversations are very engaging. You can have them anywhere. With anyone. Even short conversations can have a long- lasting effect. It is always good to have something interesting to talk about. And sometimes, things just come up and you go there.
That is what this program is all about.
My friend and mentor, the late John Callaway, and I had spirited conversations on just about every topic you can imagine. He always said that he was a generalist. He said it was because he was curious about everything.
John had an amazing approach to these kinds of things. He said once that it was an extraordinary opportunity to be able to explore a topic and talk with a guest without all the phony studio gimmicks to make the broadcast appear like the audience is having fun. No commercial breaks. Interesting topics and engaging guests. Not like TV at all, he’d say.
John believed strongly in preparation. You need to show up early and ready to play, something I have always done my entire life.
I realized somewhere along the way that I was curious about everything, too. And while I have concentrated on military history for almost three decades, we are about to venture into new, exciting territory. I am very happy that you have come along for the ride. And, I can assure you I am ready to play.
Leading up to this program, I have received a lot of emails, letters, and calls from people telling me that they appreciated all of the Library programs we produced over the years. For those who may not know, the lectures, interviews and panels were presented and broadcast live over the internet before anyone put the words "YouTube" together. They were recorded live with an audience. In the early days, that might be no more than 10 or 12 people, but we didn’t care. Every one of those people were there to hear what we had to say.
In a very short time, we assembled what would become an award-winning production team. We were picked up by WYCC and our show ran twice a week – at 6 a.m. and midnight on Sunday nights. After a few years we moved to another great slot – Friday at 3 p.m. – before negotiating Sunday morning at 10 a.m. -- head-to-head with Meet the Press.
As the years passed, we produced more than 40 original programs a season with a couple of those years at over 50. Since our production season was 9 months long, you could say we were busy with the show, running the Library, and keeping all the other farm animals happy in the barn.
Nine months. Nine years. Over 300 televised programs and a Neilsen rating of just over .349. (Actually, that's less than 1/2 of one percent, if you are doing the math.) Life was good!
One of the things about being on a weekly television program, and talking about military history and current affairs, is that attitudes change so quickly. So it was a challenge to keep the topics relevant and timely. We took that part very seriously.
And, I would be recognized from time to time, in the store or on the street. People are very nice. They talk to you like you’re an old friend, or high school classmate. The first few times it was a little awkward, but then I got used to it and actually enjoyed the conversations.
One time, a woman stopped me in the store. She was very animated and engaging.
She said: “My husband is a big fan of your show at the military library. He says the stories you tell are inspiring and very stimulating.”
Well, thank you, I said.
“Oh yes," she said, "Every Sunday morning he’d make a very nice breakfast for us. Then, we’d read the papers a bit and settle in and watch your show. Pretty soon he’d lean in and give me a kiss and, well, we were off to the races!”
"I see," I said.
“Yes," she went on to say, unbelievably. "I was a little concerned when you moved your show from late Sunday night to Sunday morning, but ... no problem!"
RON KEATON, producer, actor and writer of the acclaimed Churchill one-man show was our first guest for Conversations with Ed Tracy at the Skokie Theatre on March 23, 2016. Ron discussed his long-time acting career, future goals for SoloChicago and performed a monologue from his 2015 Joseph Jefferson Award-winning performance of Churchill.
Ron Keaton on Winston Churchill’s human side...
“Most people think of Churchill as the august, bombastic, commanding presence and he was all of that. I wanted a more human side to show. I wanted people to know that he had a family and five children. And that he did worry about his failures. He was just as human as the rest of us.”
On creating a legacy...
“I’m at a point in my life where the work I want to do not just as an actor or a person is rapidly becoming legacy… I don’t have children. I don’t have a family like a nuclear unit, so my work personally has to be what I leave behind. Solo Chicago Theatre for me is my idea of leaving something behind for others to enjoy and to learn from and to play with. ... We want SoloChicago Theatre Company to be the brand for solo performance in the United States.”
On aging...
“You’re never too old to learn something new, and that’s where I’m at.”
SOLOCHICAGO WEBSITE
This week, we are taking a short journey back to our first conversation with Ron Keaton, the producer, writer and star of the Jeff Award-winning one-man show, Churchill. We are also featuring an FTA conversation with funnyman Ed Kross for your listening pleasure, and we are showcasing much more to do in and around Chicago.
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