Philip Barry

"One of the prettiest sights in this pretty world is the privileged classes enjoying their privileges," says journalist Mike Connor in The Philadelphia Story, now at Colonial Players in Annapolis. The show is a visual feast, with well-dressed,...

The U.N. Inspector: British playwright David Farr's loose adaptation of "The Government Inspector," a satire of corruption and bureaucracy in czarist Russia, gets a nip-and-tuck courtesy of Chicago farceur James Sherman, who changes Farr's English real...

A couple of Chicago-related projects are screening at Sundance this year, including "Diminished Capacity," which is being touted as an "offbeat comedy" by the recently reconstituted Steppenwolf Films. In the company's debut movie, Terry Kinney directs...

2 stars (out of four) Horrible, horrible women are everywhere, just waiting for other women--lucky, lucky women--to exact revenge on their former employers by writing modern urban fairy tales about them. (Men do it, too, of course.) Sometimes these...

Horrible, horrible women are everywhere, just waiting for other women — lucky, lucky women — to exact revenge on their former employers by writing modern urban fairy tales about them. (Men do it, too, of course.) Sometimes these Manhattan-...

What do you think of the WGA list? ++++++++++++++++++++ || 1. || CASABLANCA Screenplay by Julius J. & Philip G. Epstein and Howard Koch. Based on the play "Everybody Comes to Rick's" by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison || || 2. || THE GODFATHER...

Katharine Hepburn, who transcended her screen roles by showing several generations how to be a woman in a way that combined sublime beauty and sexuality with fiery intelligence, died Sunday. She was 96. Her executor, Cynthia McFadden, said Hepburn died...

Was Maurine Dallas Watkins a playwright masquerading as a Chicago Tribune reporter? Or was the originator of "Chicago" an ink-stained wretch who sold out her reporter's soul to show biz? It all depends on whose opinion you believe. This much is known...

Judging by some comments, a portion of the audience for the local premiere of "High Society" at the Theatre at the Center on Friday night thought they were watching one of those classic Broadway musicals from the 1940s. The confusion is easy to...

A little past midnight on Jan. 27, the lights will go off in the Ivanhoe Theater and a significant stage of Chicago theater history will disappear. The Ivanhoe, which opened in 1966 at 750 W. Wellington St. as the namesake of its adjoining parent...

Although the Theatre at the Center is opening only its second show of the current season Friday night, artistic director Michael Webber is thinking well past tonight's local area premiere of "High Society." He's got the 2001-2002 season already...

"When you're going through hell, keep going" was Winston Churchill's sage counsel. It's advice that could apply totoday's troubled kids. Opening Friday in a staging by Rivendell Theatre Ensemble,"The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Age 13 3/4" is Sue...