Get free tickets to Rent, playing at Dominican University Performing Arts Center in River Forest.  Goldstar freebies ALWAYS have limited in availability so don’t delay.

Set in New York City’s East Village, Rent is about falling in love, finding your voice and living for today. Winner of the Tony Award for Best Musical and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the Broadway hit has become a pop culture phenomenon with songs that rock and a story that resonates with power and passion. Based loosely on Puccini’s La Boheme, Jonathan Larson’s Rent follows a year in the life of a group of penniless young artists and musicians struggling to survive and create under the shadow of HIV/AIDS. The physical and emotional complications of the disease pervade the lives of Roger, Mimi, Tom and Angel. Maureen deals with her chronic infidelity through performance art; her partner, Joanne, wonders if their relationship is worth the trouble. Benny has sold out his Bohemian ideals in exchange for a hefty income and is on the outs with his former friends. Mark, an aspiring filmmaker, feels like an outsider to life in general. How these young bohemians negotiate their dreams, loves and conflicts provides the narrative thread to this groundbreaking rock musical.

Goldstar is offering free tickets to Superior Donuts for a couple of performance next week. I wanted to see this production in Chicago, then when it was on Broadway – the fact that it’s back in Chicago with free tickets must be a sign from the Gods (couldn’t they just give me winning lottery numbers?).

Mary-Arrchie Theatre Company (in the Royal George Theatre across from Steppenwolf Theatre) reprises its acclaimed production of the Chicago-set Superior Donuts, the delicious comedy-drama from Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Tracy Letts (August: Osage County). It’s the story of the off-beat friendship that grows between the cantankerous white owner of a struggling uptown donut shop — a former radical who holds on tight to the past — and his only employee, an ambitious African-American teenager who has big dreams for the place. The company’s first run of this production was nominated for four prestigious Jeff Awards and recommended by the Chicago Reader.

Profiles Theatre presents the 20th-anniversary production of Hellcab. For the first time, Hellcab, directed by Profiles Co-Artistic Director Darrell W. Cox, features a cast of 34 — the largest cast in the company’s history. The show presents a day in the life of a cab driver in for the longest night of his life as he transports a bizarre and mysterious collection of customers through the gritty streets of Chicago.  Playwright Will Kern draws from personal experience as a former cab driver to create this alternately frightening, hilarious and poignant journey. Throughout his long shift, the eclectic collection of passengers includes a trio of drug addicts, a smug lawyer, a born-again couple, and a randy couple on their way to a motel. Set during a bitter cold Christmas Eve, Hellcab is a parade of human experience as seen through the rear-view mirror.

Tickets are $10 and performances include November week days and weekends.

sounds like Cash Cab on narcotics…

Get free tickets to Disfunctioning:  A double feature of short plays by Romanian and French playwright Eugene Ionesco, who once described his one-act sketches as “anti-plays” because of their unconventional structures, surreal comedic aspects and parodies of traditional theater. In this performance of two short Ionesco plays, Rare Terra Theatre presents The Lesson and Jack, or the Submission, both written in the 1950s and translated from French. The Lesson, a play about a professor and his pupil, has been in permanent production at Paris’ Theatre de la Huchette since 1957 and has been adapted for dance by the Royal Danish Ballet and the Joffrey Ballet. Jack, or the Submission involves nonsensical dialogue and a farcical approach to family drama. Funny and at times ridiculous, these seminal Ionesco plays are considered two of the most important works within the genre of “Theatre of the Absurd.”

QED: A Theatrical Portrait of Maverick Physicist Richard Feynman is available today on Goldstar starting at $5 for tickets for November performance dates.
Theoretical physicist and Nobel Prize winner Richard Feynman was highly respected by his fellow scientists for his work in quantum and particle physics. He was also enormously popular with non-scientists for his work presenting physics topics like nanotechnology and quantum mechanics to the general public in an engaging and understandable way. He was perhaps most well-known for his hilarious collections of anecdotes from his life and work, including the wildly popular Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman! This up-close and personal portrait by Peter Parnell relives a day in the life of Mr. Feynman, presenting scenes from both his professional life (working on the Manhattan Project and the Challenger inquiry) to his personal life (the death of his wife and his own fight with cancer). This touching and laugh-out-loud biographical play brings forth the humor, warmth and personality that made Richard Feynman a beloved figure of 20th century science.

Goldstar has free tickets (and up to $11) for Last Comic Standing’s Alonzo Bodden appearing at The Chicago Improv of Schaumburg.  The freebie tickets are for this Thursday and Sunday nights – other nights are deeply discounted.   Alonzo Bodden has showcased his brand of sharp observational stand-up on Late Night with Conan O’Brien, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Comedy Central Presents and other TV shows.  He’s appeared in a number of feature films, including the Steve Martin movie Bringing Down the House, The Girl Next Door and Scary Movie 4.

Goldstar still has tickets available (at discounts, natch!) at the Akoo (formerly the Rosemont) Theatre for the Radio City Christmas Spectacular with the Rockettes.  Performance dates are mid-December, so perfect for a family Christmas outing.

In the dark comedy Fuddy Meers, every morning, amnesiac Claire wakes up a stranger in her own home. Before she can relearn who she is, a limping, lisping man leaps out from under her bed and forces her on a ride filled with a vulgar hand puppet, a drugged-out teen, a claustrophobic cop and lots of gibberish. Through this cacophony of characters, Claire is ultimately able to piece together the fragments of her life. Written by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright David Lindsay-Abaire, Fuddy Meers explores the question: Who can you trust in a world of strangers?  Performances weekends through December; free tickets for November performances.

Get free tickets to The Laughing Chameleon, the North Shore’s only full-service comedy, magic and variety club offering entertainment seven days a week. The club opened in December 2011 and brings world-renowned performers and exciting up-and-comers to the stage on a regular basis. In addition to hosting top-notch performers, The Laughing Chameleon offers a full bar with specially-designed cocktails and small-plate restaurant service provided by the adjacent Flight Restaurant & Wine Bar, all in the heart of the North Shore.  Please see the full event description for a list of upcoming shows.