**** Highly Recommended **** The Second City’s 111th Mainstage Revue, Don't Quit Your Daydream is downright hilarious. Although there were a couple of political zingers, this revue wasn’t angry, political or even newsy. It was just funny! If fact, I think it’s quite possibly the funniest revue they’ve done in ages. Everywhere I looked people were laughing. 4 BIG Spotlights
Andy Bolduc, Kiley Fitzgerald, Claire McFadden, Evan Mills, and Julia Morales return from the 100th Mainstage Revue; Jordan Stafford is the newcomer to the cast They wrote as well as performed all the black-outs, silly sketches, improv, tongue-in-cheek commentary, satire and slapstick comedy.
This cast really relates to the audience, too, involving individuals in sketches, asking for questions, inviting comments. Finally, this cast can laugh at themselves – as they did a couple of times during the performance.
My favorite sketches in Don’t Quit Your Daydream
- Kiley Fitzgerald plays both menopausal Barbie and a nun singing about teen birth control failures
- A guy double dates with his girlfriend’s brother who is reconnecting with his imaginary friend from childhood. Apparently the imaginary girlfriend can’t keep her imaginary hands to herself. Eventually the imaginary girlfriend grabs the boyfriend.
- Wearing a ruffled shirt, a ridiculous over one shoulder cape and a cane, Andy Bolduc plays a bizarre business advisor who calls himself the Advisor to the King, interacts with the audience. At one point he tells a woman that so-and-so betrayed her, then suggested that teamwork makes the guillotine work!
- Evan Mills plays a pretentious visitor who shares stories of his jobs as a movie extra – quickly reacting to title suggestions from the audience
- Claire McFadden lectures students about empathy, but when one student (Andy Bolduc) hasn’t had any problems, she goes totally off on him
- Jordan Stafford, who was firmly in denial, falls in love with Evan Mills
- Andy Bolduc begging Julia Morales to let him into black heaven because white heaven is so boring
The Second City’s 110th Mainstage Revue, Don’t Quit Your Daydream, is in an open run at The Second City Mainstage Theatre, 1616 N. Wells Street, Chicago. Parking in the adjacent garage is readily available but pricey. Bar-food and drinks are available throughout the performance. Running time is just about two hours, with an intermission. Performances are Tuesdays through Thursdays at 8:00 pm, Fridays and Saturdays at 7:00 and 10:00 pm, Sundays at 7:00 pm. Tickets range from $45-$109. FYI (312) 337-3992 or www.secondcity.com.