“Love,Loss,and What I Wore”

 Recommended Many theater-goers recall with fond memories the brilliant “The Vagina Monologues” that was composed of many little stories told by women of their lives and read/narrated by three women. This was an evening filled with many emotions and gave us, the audience, in particular the male audience members a little insight into the minds of women. In “Love,Loss,and What I Wore” by Nora and Delia Ephron, based on the book by Ilene Beckerman, we are revisiting this concept, but with five women instead of three and while much of the words come from Beckerman’s book, there are other anecdotes and stories added to the mix for flavor and variety.

Directed by Karen Carpenter with five very talented ladies who play off each other when needed on the small and intimate stage of the Broadway In Chicago Playhouse at Water Tower Place, this is a seamless 95 minutes of story-telling. I am not sure what a director really does when the majority of the time the actresses are seated, except to let them know when to react or look a certain way or better yet, just allow them to feel with their hearts and souls what the writer(s) were saying. The house was mostly women, as one would think for a show like this, and yet, I found it open to understandability for the male members of the audience as well. My wife was surprised at some of the things I “got”. As I told her,”these may be things from your life, but as an onlooker, these are things I see every day”!

There are numerous stories, mostly filled with comic touches and well told by the likes of one of my favorite actressesin Chicago, Barbara Robertson who tells “Gingy’s Story” and does so with illustrations of the clothes involved. The stories about her “first time”, her wedding, her divorce  and all the way to becoming a grandmother ( a wonderful story that will bring a tear to each grandmother in the audience) and at the very end, teaching us how to draw a woman- sheer delight! But the stories are varied: “The Bra”,”Madonna”, “The Gang Sweater” ( right out of Pilsen), “The Closet”, “Fat/Thin”, “The Dressing Room” and one of my favorites, “I Hate My Purse” ( from Nora Ephron’s “I Feel Bad About My Back”.

The other members of this brilliant cast are  Felicia Fields ( hercharacter’s  story about “breast Cancer” is quite revealing and emotional) who handles comedy to perfection, the perky and adorable Roni Geva, The bubbly Katie O’Brien and the delightful Nora Dunn ( you might recall her from SNL on tv)- these women are a pleasure to watch and listen to and despite the fact that they are seated with books in front of them, after awhile, you forget they are reading someone else’s stories and start to feel that perhaps this is what they are feeling. looking around at the almost full house ( on a Tuesday night, no less), it appeared to be how others felt , and what else can an actress project? They all did their job!

“Love,Loss”  will continue at The Broadway In Chicago Playhouse through December 4th with performances as follows:

Tuesday-Friday evenings at 7:30 p.m., Saturdays at 2 and 8 p.m., Sundays at 2 p.m.

Additional performances can be found by visiting  www.BroadwayInChicago.com

Thanksgiving NO PERFORMANCES but on Friday 11/25 an added matinee at 2 p.m.. A perfect break in your “black friday” shopping day considering the theater is located at  Water Tower Place on Michigan Avenue

Tickets range from $68- $78 and are available at any of the Broadway In Chicago box offices, by calling 312-642-2000 or online at www.BroadwayInChicago.com

Discounted Parking is available in the Water Tower Garage ( allow some extra time as they do put you through security

Audience members are invited to donate “gently used” purses and other accessories in the lobby inn support of “Dress For Success”

Broadway In Chicago thanks you in advance.