“A Town Called Progress”

[rating=4] It is always nice to see a local writer complete their product and allow Chicago to see it first. We are a strong theater community with talent in every portion of the total production known as “live theater”! Promethean is now doing a world premiere at The Den Theatre of “A Town Called Progress” written by Trina Kakacek.

“A Town Called Progress” is a unique story that explores the funny parts of life as a woman, Ida (Cameron Feagin is an amazing actress, who makes this character very real in spite of the silly story), unhappy with the towns that surround her land, decides to build her own community. Her desire is to build a community based on gender and economic equality.

The town has Backwards to the East and Conspiratorial to the West. The names tell you a little bit about the community and of course its inhabitants. The names are very telling!

Ida has declared herself Mayor of Progress. There is one more person residing in her town, Vivian ( adorably played by Kali Skatcke) who does all the cooking at the diner. They are the only people in the town so money is not anything to worry about. In the center of the city, they have signs posted- one is to let newcomers see the population is 2. One of the signs is for help needed as they have a truck stuck in a rut and need a strong man to get it back on the road. They also are in need of a man to help populate their town with Vivian, who is prepared to do this.

Two newcomers come to Progress. One is Slim (deftly handled by Teri Talo) who is smart and looking to start a new life and make money. Weed, an eerie cowboy ( a wild interpretation of a cowboy played to perfection by Chris Woolsey). As I said earlier, Vivian wants a baby ( needs one to grow the population) and Weed is the only candidate. He adores her bacon, so says he will stay ( as the play goes on, we find that he has feelings for Ida), and Slim is in love with Vivian and we see that it is their love that will help make the town truly become a town.

The story deals with gender, economics ( there is a big deal about Slim getting them the best water, charging the neighboring towns) and a whole lot of “family”. What is meant to be a utopia has the ups and downs of any city anywhere, but this particular story has a very happy ending.

Anna C. Bahow’s sharp direction makes the story move along at a quick pace. The play is in two acts with the first being over an hour and the second being 40 minutes with about 20 minutes for intermission. To be honest, a little cut here and a trim there could make this a 90-100 minute play without intermission. Why break the story up and have the audience have to get back into it? After all, this is a farcical look at Utopia, so don’t let them think about it until they have the whole story!

The set (Jeremiah Barr who also did the props) is cute and considering the low budgets that smaller theater companies have, pretty decent. Rachel M. Sypniewski’s costumes are very fitting. In particular the dress that Weed loves wearing. I did mention that gender is unimportant in this one, didn’t I? The sound (Emily Hayman) and lighting( Karen Wallace) are both efficient. Part of what Ida is trying to create in her Utopia is that women are on top- in other words, in control ( on everything).

“A Town Called Progress” will continue at The Den Theatre thru April 15th  with performances as follows:

Friday  8 p.m.

Saturday  8 p.m.

Sundays  3 p.m. (except 4/9)

Tickets $26/ $21 seniors/$16 students and military

To order tickets call 773-697-3830 or visit www.thedentheatre.com

The Den is located at 1331 N. Milwaukee Avenue- second floor

Warning- there is sexulaity in this show as well as a rifle ( not real) gunshots and a baby is born onstage

To see what others are saying, visit www.theatreinchicago.com, go to Review Round-Up and click at “A Town Called Progress”.