Chicago razzles back
Playhouse dates for Feb 2024
The latest UK tour of Chicago has announced new venues, including a week at both the Edinburgh Playhouse (Tue 4 – Sat 8 Feb 2025: tickets) and the Glasgow Kings (Mon 18 – Sat 23 Aug 2025: tickets).
Murder, greed, corruption, exploitation, adultery, treachery… and All That Jazz, will be on stage as the tour sets off from Milton Keynes (Sat 12 – Sat 19 Oct 2024: tickets). It is now scheduled to play 34 dates around the UK and Ireland before winding up in Glasgow, including dates at His Majesty’s, Aberdeen in January 2025 (Tue 14 – Sat 18: tickets).
Image from a previous tour of Chicago. Pic: Tristram Kenton.
Set amidst the razzle-dazzle decadence of the 1920s, Chicago is the story of Roxie Hart, a housewife and nightclub dancer who murders her on-the-side lover after he threatens to walk out on her.
Desperate to avoid conviction, she dupes the public, the media and her rival cellmate, Velma Kelly, by hiring Chicago’s slickest criminal lawyer to transform her malicious crime into a barrage of sensational headlines, the likes of which might just as easily be ripped from today’s tabloids.
satire on corruption
First staged in 1975, with music by John Kander, lyrics by Fred Ebb, and book by Ebb and Bob Fosse, the musical is based on a 1926 play of the same title by reporter Maurine Dallas Watkins, based in the true life crimes and criminals on which she reported.
The story is a satire on corruption in the administration of criminal justice and the concept of the “celebrity criminal”.
The 1996 Broadway revival of the show is choreographed by Ann Reinking in the style of Bob Fosse, directed by Walter Bobbie, and produced by Barry and Fran Weissler. It has played over 33,500 performances world wide since opening in New York.
Listing
Chicago
Edinburgh Playhouse, 18 – 22 Greenside Place, EH1 3AA.
Tue 4 – Sat 8 February 2025
Evenings: 7.30pm; Matinee Thurs, Sat: 2.30pm.
Tickets and details: Book here.
Glasgow King’s Theatre, 297 Bath St, Glasgow G2 4JN
Mon 18 – Sat 23 August 2025.
Evenings: 7.30pm; Matinee Thurs, Sat: 2.30pm.
Tickets and details: Book here.
ENDS
