Chicago Folks Operetta has carved a niche over the past decade by specializing in long-forgotten hits from the “Silver Age” of European operetta in Vienna and Berlin in the 1910s and ’20s—schmaltzy, tuneful romantic comedies that evoke nostalgia for a simpler age before the First World War shattered the established order of European imperial politics and culture. But now—marking the 100th anniversary of America’s entry into World War I—CFO has taken a bold gamble on the long-overdue Chicago premiere of Kurt Weill and Paul Green’s 1936 operetta Johnny Johnson.
The Group recruited Weill and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright-poet Paul Green to write an antiwar comedy in the style of a song-and-sketch revue, a popular form on the Depression-era New York stage. Directed by Strasberg, with musical direction by Lehman Engel, Johnny Johnson was a 1936 Broadway flop, due in large part to the clashing artistic visions of Weill, Green, and Strasberg. Weill went on to have more success with the musicals Knickerbocker Holiday, Lady in the Dark, One Touch of Venus, Street Scene, and Lost in the Stars; after his death in 1950, an off-Broadway revival of his 1928 The Threepenny Opera became his biggest and most enduring hit.
Through 7/9: Thu-Sat 7:30 PM, Sun 2 PM Stage 773 1225 W. Belmont 773-327-5252chicagofolksoperetta.org $40, $35 seniors, $30 students
