Mike Schramm

The Hideout is brimming with Chicago's literati. They're all here for "The Dollar Store," a monthly show run by Jonathan Messinger of thisisgrand.org. Messinger has picked up three items from Chicago's finer dollar stores, and passed them out to three of Chicago's finer writers and performers to serve as inspiration.

Messinger is up first, introducing the show, and using a flimsy plastic clamp called "the Xtend-a-hand" (as seen on television) to come up with a story about a man who can grow extra body parts at will, who wonders what "self" means if you can so easily change and dispose of it. Messinger and co-host Seth Gardner (there's a lot of "co-"ing going on at this show--the whole night seems very collaborative) then introduce tonight's three artists.

THE2NDHAND's Jeb Gleason-Allured is first. He's received a clear plastic pill case, and, in front of a tableau of slides, tells what might be the best story of the night. It's about two schoolchildren who take invisibility pills on a field trip. As they wander through exhibits like "The Krispy Kreme Hall of Subjugated Peoples" (Allured's steady reading garners laughs from the audience of authors), they slowly disappear, escaping from the world around them. Until the end of the story, when they suddenly reappear to find the world around them disappearing, until they're the only ones left, waving at each other in a void. It's an amazing story, made more amazing by the fact that it was inspired by a plastic pillbox that costs a buck.

ImprovOlympics' Pat O'Brien goes next, riffing on a magnet that says, "Friendship doubles our joy and divides our sorrows." His performance ties together writer's block, making out with a clear piece of plastic that stands in for an imaginary woman, and making fun of Matchbox Twenty's "3 A.M."

Neo-futurist and Goat Islander Karen Christopher finishes off the evening, with a monologue based on a toy boom-box that plays an electronic version of "Fur Elise." She talks about planning to write but being put off by the Tsunami disaster. She gives a history of Beethoven, of his ideas of love and who Elise really was. Among various quotes from popular songs about love and commitment, she talks about a theme all the writers in the audience know very well: the reasons for writing, the impetus behind creation, and what Beethoven really wanted to do when he wrote a song for a woman he knew and we don't. "Even if you hadn't asked me," Christopher says as she finishes her monologue, "I would have done it for you anyway." And while Messinger and his writers at the Hideout may claim that sentiment came from a dollar-store toy, the audience knows better.

(2005-01-11)

Also by Mike Schramm

Umphrey's McGee
Listening to Umphrey's McGee's June release, "Anchor Drops," you get the feeling that it's onto something big
(2004-12-21)

Susan Werner
"I can be anything for you, baby," songstress Susan Werner croons on the title track of her latest album, "but I can't be new."
(2004-12-21)

Play with horses
Inside a castle in the middle of Old Town, banners and shields decorate the walls, and dimly lit corridors lead to a great hall, with rows of wooden counters and seats facing a huge indoor theatre
(2004-12-14)

Game boys
High Voltage Software has finished its new PlayStation 2 game, Duel Masters, based on a Japanese cartoon about card players who fight with demons. Inside one of Red Eye Studio's motion capture studios in Hoffman Estates, they're throwing a wrap party to reward their staff and release the game
(2004-12-07)

Free books
(2004-11-17)

Bringing up Baby
(2004-11-10)

Entrance polling
(2004-10-27)

about Newcitychicago | about Newcity magazine | advertising | privacy policy | FAQ | employment