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Black Ensemble Theater

4.6

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Neighborhood: Uptown

4520 N. Beacon St.

Chicago, IL 60640

773-769-4451

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This comfortable, 170-seat, three-quarter thrust theater was home to the Organic Theater Company for seven years ("Bleacher Bums" premiered there in 1977) and later housed Zebra Crossing Theatre. Since 1986 it has been run by the non-Equity Black Ensemble Theater, whose founder and artistic director, Jackie Taylor, has created African-American transformations of classics ("Medea," "Julius Caesar," "The Glass Menagerie," "A Streetcar Named Desire") and a series of affirmative "history musicals" about black composers and artists. A perennial Ensemble favorite is Taylor's "The Other Cinderella," an alternative retelling of the fairy tale with Cinderella as a girl from the projects and the fairy godmother a Jamaican sorceress. Musical director Jimmy Tillman has ensured that the music cooks with power and authenticity, most notably in his recent tributes to Teddy Pendergrass, Jackie Wilson, Dionne Warwicke, Otis Redding, Brooks Benton, Sarah Vaughan, Billy Eckstine and Ella Fitzgerald. Good sight lines and seats, fair acoustics and OK air conditioning.