Category: Reviews

Joseph & the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat

Jae-Ha Kim

Previous productions of “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” didn’t seem as fun or entertaining as the current incarnation, now in an open run at the Royal George Theatre. Granted, this staging of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical is much scaled down from the 1993 production starring Donny Osmond at the Chicago Theatre. But this version–the first non-touring commercial production to be granted rights for use of updated material–has a good time interpreting Lloyd Webber’s kitsch.

‘N Sync’s Lance Bass ‘On the Line’ in his first film

Jae-Ha Kim

Envy me, girls. I am in Lance Bass’s hotel room and guess what? He happens to be here, too.
Never mind that we’re surrounded by his assistant, makeup artist, a handful of publicists and a photographer. I think I saw love in his eyes. OK, maybe it was just the sunlight reflecting from the windows of the W Hotel on Lake Shore Drive. But the point is, Bass–one-fifth of the phenomenally popular boy band ‘N Sync–is so charming he can even make cranky reporters smile.

‘Jin-Roh: The Wolf Brigade’ a war movie without any heroes

Jae-Ha Kim

What if Japan had been occupied by Nazi Germany after World War II? “Jin-Roh: The Wolf Brigade” explores this possibility by presenting an alternative nation. In this Japanese animated film, Tokyo is dark, bleak and industrial. The city is a war zone, with the police and military battling a small but well-trained group of elite terrorists who negotiate their way through the city’s sewer system. They employ women and children to act as decoys. They have all been trained to believe there is honor in dying for their cause.

Michael T. Weiss pulls weight in ‘Bones’

Jae-Ha Kim

As the star of “The Pretender,” Michael T. Weiss grew accustomed to wearing natty designer clothes. For his role as a corrupt, corpulent cop in the film “Bones”–which opens Wednesday–Weiss wore a different kind of suit: a fat suit. “People who haven’t seen me since ‘The Pretender’ are going to think, ‘Boy, he really let himself go,'” says the ordinarily lean 6-foot-3 actor.

“Lisa Picard is Famous”

Jae-Ha Kim

A t the end of “Lisa Picard Is Famous,” Griffin Dunne says, “Sometimes reality just needs a little push.” Apparently, that’s what the filmmakers were trying to accomplish with this mockumentary. Dunne portrays a filmmaker named Andrew, whose goal is to document a person on the brink of fame. But fame is a nebulous thing, and trying to anticipate who will become famous enough to sell his documentary is a crapshoot. He thinks he has found a winning subject in Lisa Picard, a Penelope Miller look-alike who has won some notoriety for starring in a suggestive cereal commercial.

The Backstreet Boys at the Tweeter Center

Jae-Ha Kim

For all the hammering that boy bands get, the Backstreet Boys were the perfect group to see Saturday night. Just a couple weeks after the terrorist attacks on the United States and talks of impending war, it was a relief to lose yourself in a two-hour show where all you had to worry about was not getting hit with a flying stuffed animal. The Backstreet Boys show was all about fun.

‘Creepers’ nothing to scream about

Jae-Ha Kim

“You know the part in scary movies where somebody does something really stupid and everybody hates them for it?,” Trish says to her thrill-seeking brother, Darry, in the horror film “Jeepers Creepers.” “Well, this is it.” Right on cue, lil’ bro’ falls down a drainage pipe that leads to a deserted church basement decorated in tacky 1970s gore. There are a few hundred dead (but incredibly well-preserved) bodies here, a sutured stomach or neck part there. Nothing he can’t handle. Yet.

Real World Confidential: Griping, groping on North Avenue

Jae-Ha Kim

You’ve got to feel a little bad for the Chicago cast of “The Real World.” The seven young ‘uns probably thought they’d get to live rent-free for the summer in a way-cool house in way-cool Wicker Park, hang with a Pumpkin or two and use the MTV soap opera-style documentary to launch their 15 minutes of fame.

Russell Crowe’s Garage-band sound goes over big at House of Blues

Jae-Ha Kim

He came out in a thong and little else. Unfortunately for the capacity crowd of (predominantly) women who came Monday night to see actor Russell Crowe in the first of two sold-out House of Blues shows, the thong wasn’t on the studly Oscar winner. It was worn by an aboriginal dancer who seemed to scare some members of the audience with his jolting moves.

Sex, sex and more sex

Jae-Ha Kim

Your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to make love with your partner three to five times a week. Now if you’re wondering how the heck you’re going to squeeze all that nooky into your busy schedule–the kids, the job, the social and community duties–perhaps you need to go on a diet, a sex diet. This concept is designed to let you have more, not less, whoopee, according to Laura Corn, in her new book.