Oct. 29--This weekend in New York, producer Scott Rudin told me he watched the Roundabout Theater Company's production of Stephen Karam's "The Humans," a play he first had read after its premiere at the American Theater Company in Chicago, through a haze of tears. Somewhere before the end, Rudin decided the play deserved to be on Broadway. Being in a position to make such things happen, he made it happen. The deal was done in about four days. "The Humans," an exquisite piece set on an ordinary Thanksgiving and probing the fears of a struggling, earnest American family, will hit Broadway sometime this spring.
Roundabout has an annoying -- well, if you live and work in Chicago, it's annoying -- habit of avoiding any mention of previous productions of plays; ATC, a small Chicago theater, is not exactly in a position to press that case. While it's true that Karam has a long-standing relationship with the Broadway-savvy nonprofit, and that the Roundabout production long was in the works, there's no question that the late PJ Paparelli, the director of that original Chicago production, was all over that script -- one of the characters was, in part, based on him. Joe Mantello, the director of the show in New York, was there at ATC on opening night, watching. So, the move of "The Humans" is a further reminder of Paparelli's formidable artistic legacy. And if you missed it here, when it was hardly commanding Broadway prices, please listen to me the next time.
Which brings me to Paparelli's memorial service in July.
Toward the end of that event, held at the Atheneum Theatre, Jim Jacobs, the co-creator of "Grease," took the podium. Like a lot of people that emotional night, Jacobs looked a little shaky on his feet. He blinked out at those assembled and recalled the loss of his friend and collaborator Warren Casey, the other co-creator of "Grease." He talked about how it had taken years to find another collaborator whom he actually trusted -- when you have "Grease" money, you get a lot of offers -- and that now he'd suddenly lost him too. Casey died, from AIDS, when he was 53. Paparelli died, in a road accident, when he was 40.
This coming summer, Jacobs and Paparelli had been planning to update the Jacobs-and-Casey musical "Island of Lost Coeds," a spoof of Hollywood B-movies first performed at Columbia College Chicago in 1981, under the direction of the late Sheldon Patinkin. It has never been produced in a major professional production, although it "came within an eyelash" of being produced in London, Jacobs said.
It's no secret that American Theater Company had very little money under Paparelli. It's also no secret that ATC faced something of an existential crisis after the loss of its artistic leader. There were those around town who thought that it might not continue to exist. But Paparelli already had put together almost all of the 2015-16 season -- Ethan McSweeny's production of Thomas Bradshaw's "Fulfillment" opens next month -- and his friend Bonnie Metzgar showed up in the theater's office saying she wanted to help on an interim basis. So ATC has kept going.
And Jacobs has stepped up to be one of its public faces.
On Wednesday, the native of Chicago's Northwest Side told me he would be making a $50,000 gift to the theater to support its productions of new work. He hopes others will match his commitment to Paparelli's legacy.
"It's really about, 'Let's keep the theater going,'" Jacobs said in an interview from San Diego on Wednesday.
Of course, ATC also will need a new artistic leader, and that person should not have to contend with the looming presence of his or her predecessor. Art Cunningham, president of the theater's board of directors, said Wednesday that was well understood. He also said that his board is sifting through more than 80 candidates for Paparelli's job, a position in which, for the record, no one is likely to make a fortune
But there's more to life than money. ATC might still be fragile from a business perspective, but its artistic moment, demonstrably, has already arrived. Pondering the success of "The Humans," a play I truly love, this week, I was struck by how easily it can be read as a metaphor for that struggling, sometimes frustrating Chicago theater and those who struggled within its walls.
But that's just a local story; "The Humans" now has greater reach.
cjones5@tribpub.com
