Paramount Theatre’s Newsies
Fall 2019. Directed by Jim Corti. Photo by Liz Lauren.
Results
Lucky Plush’s The Map of Now
Pick up the June issue of New City! Theater and dance editor Sharon Hoyer previews The Map of Now, a radically new, interactive digital festival with Lucky Plush Productions’ artistic director Julia Rhoads. The Map of Now uses the Gather.Town virtual platform to pair the aesthetics of 80s retro video games with a turbo-charged line-up of Chicago dance, theater, music and comedy artists. Performers include Darling Shear, Jeremy Owens, avery r. young, and of course, Lucky Plush. So ambitious is Julia’s idea that it morphed into a four-venue virtual festival presented with the Harris Theater of Music and Dance, Links Hall, the Logan Center and Steppenwolf’s 1700 Theatre. Get your tickets, create your avatar and get ready to navigate The Map of Now at luckyplush.com.
Manual Cinema’s Christmas Carol
The campaign for Manual Cinema’s first-ever holiday production yielded universal local and national critical acclaim, which spurred inclusion in this NBC Nightly News round-up of top virtual Christmas Carols around the world.
Community Foundation of the Fox River Valley
A strategically timed and targeted pitch resulted in a front-page, above-the-fold. Daily Herald news feature on Giving Tuesday introducing CFFRV’s Youth Engagement in Philanthropy (YEP) Class of 2020-21: 21 diverse students from seven Fox Valley high schools ready to prove you don’t have to be an adult to start living a life of philanthropy.
Chicago Children’s Theatre
Two pages of the January 2021 issue of Chicago Magazine are devoted to Chicago Children’s Theatre’s new Springboard Project, a new works initiative for BIPOC writers, and the first Springboard project to debut virtually, Diamond’s Dream by Jerrell L. Henderson and Caitlin MacLeod.
Collaboraction
Right before the holiday, WTTW-TV Chicago Tonight premiered Collaboraction’s new Call Time campaign, a series of video PSAs that shares mental health resources with Chicago theater workers and destigmatizes mental illness.
Chicago Latino Theater Alliance
Advance coverage like this live talk back on FOX 32 Good Day Chicago helped Destinos al Aire, a socially distanced celebration of Latino theater, music and culture, held in lieu of CLATA’s usual six-week international Destinos festival, become a sold-out, smash success.
Chicago Jazz Orchestra
When the CJO confirmed Blue Lou Marini, the dishwasher-turned-sax player in The Blues Brothers, was headlining a live, outdoor, socially distanced concert celebrating the 40th anniversary of my all-time favorite movie, I made sure the Chicago Tribune’s jazz writer knew about it.