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Theater: Ryback is Terrific as ‘Liberace’
Theater

Ryback is Terrific as ‘Liberace’

Bur MCT’s funny, dazzling, one-man show turns too dark and maudlin in second act.

Milwaukee Chamber Theatre Presents Brent Hazelton’s LIBERACE! With Milwaukee Native And Off-Broadway Star Brett Ryback
Press Release

Milwaukee Chamber Theatre Presents Brent Hazelton’s LIBERACE! With Milwaukee Native And Off-Broadway Star Brett Ryback

Created in collaboration with the Liberace Foundation for the Performing and Creative Arts

A CHARLIE BROWN CHRISTMAS returns to First Stage this holiday season
Press Release

A CHARLIE BROWN CHRISTMAS returns to First Stage this holiday season

November 24, 2017 – December 31, 2017

SOUVENIR Begins Performances at Milwaukee Rep – Sept 8
Press Release

SOUVENIR Begins Performances at Milwaukee Rep – Sept 8

Souvenir begins performances September 8 and runs through November 5, 2017 in the Stackner Cabaret.

Just in time for Valentine’s Day, Skylight Music Theatre presents the Second-longest Running Off-Broadway Musical in History <em>I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change</em>
Just in time for Valentine’s Day, Skylight Music Theatre presents the Second-longest Running Off-Broadway Musical in History I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change
“It’s A Wonderful Life” As A Radio Play — But Onstage

“It’s A Wonderful Life” As A Radio Play — But Onstage

Next Act’s clever Christmas show reframes the classic movie once again.

The Season Ahead: Next Act Theatre
The Season Ahead

Next Act Theatre

David Cecsarini opens the season with "Perfect Mendacity," a complex play about truth and deception, but it's just one of Next Act's diverse offerings this year.

The Daly News

The Daly News

World history and personal history collide in this charming musical about the lives of a Milwaukee family during World War II. During the war, Martin and “Schatzie” Daly had five children– four sons and a daughter.  All four sons enlisted in the military, and the daughter married a military man. The family was scattered around the globe. To keep everyone in touch, Martin Daly wrote a weekly newsletter he called “The Daly News” that collated all the information from letters received from his children and then included news from the home front, as well. He did this for more than three years. Photo by Mark Frohna When Jonathan Gillard Daly, the youngest son of Martin’s oldest son, was presented with the complete Daly News as a Christmas present by his mother, he was immediately struck by the story. Several years later, we have the result: a delightful musical produced by the Milwaukee Chamber Theater, starring Jon Daly, Jack Forbes Wilson, and Jeff Schaetzke. The Daly News is a charming blend of personal anecdote and grand story. All parts in the show (including the women) are played by the three male actors. They move from one character with the addition or subtraction of a coat, a sweater, a hat. For the most part this works well, with the exception of the Daly wives. Because they make such brief appearances, it’s nearly impossible to keep them straight with no tip except a small hat. Wilson moves effortlessly between the youngest Daly son, who starts off the play as a pipsqueak teenager before enlisting in the Marines, and brother Gene, who is living in a foxhole in the South Pacific. Jon Daly anchors the show as both himself, recounting personal experiences with his uncles, and as patriarch Martin Daly. Jeff Schaetzke takes a hilarious turn as Schatzie, among many others. The underlying theme of The Daly News is not the war, despite the fact that the war is the catalyst for everything that happens, but rather is the relationship between fathers and sons. The Daly family is representative of many families in that the affection between men remains unspoken. Despite everything, the boys all strive to present witty banter to their father in their letters, not the reality of the what they are living.  Martin writes his newsletters in the same tone.  Despite everyone’s pain at separation and the uncertainty of war, no affection is explicitly expressed. Jon Daly makes a point of calling attention to this at the end of the show, reflecting on his own relationship with his father. The Daly News runs in the Broadway Theater Center Studio Theater until December 14.  414-291-7800 or www.chamber-theatre.com for tickets.