Chicago’s Theater District just got bigger.
Located on the 14th floor of the Cambria Hotel Chicago Loop at 32 W. Randolph, a cavernous new theater space is emerging as the home for Teatro ZinZanni’s “Love, Chaos and Dinner,” an immersive cirque/music/improv production slated to begin performances April 5, 2019.
Self-described as “the Kit Kat Club on acid,” the show by the West Coast-based Teatro ZinZanni and presented here by the Randolph Entertainment partnership also is running now in Seattle with a San Francisco production planned for next year. It features a four-course feast created by Goddess and the Grocer’s Debbie Sharpe, accompanied by an international cast of entertainers including trapeze artists, hoop aerialists, acrobats, live musicians and more. Improv comedian/actor Frank Ferrante serves as the emcee for the madcap hijinks and world-class cirque performances.
Reminiscent of “Absinthe” at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, the show is set inside a massive, 4,000-piece Belgian mirrored tent, or “Spiegeltent ZaZou” (resembling a gigantic circus tent from the outside) lavishly adorned inside in silver hues, grand chandeliers and wood accents. The movable tent, designed specifically for live performances, spans 72 feet across. The production arrives here from Europe in November to begin construction and installations.
“Not a single nail” is used in assembling the tent, “as historically they were designed to go up in day, down in a day,” said Randolph Partnership producer Stan Feig. Due to the enormity of some of the tent’s pieces, a helicopter will deliver 200 to 300 pieces via a hole in the building’s roof come December.
“Chicago is the golden city of culture,” said Teatro ZinZanni founder Norman Langill during opening remarks at Wednesday’s media event. “This space is pretty incredible and it’s so wonderful to find a hidden, forgotten space especially in the theater district that we can bring alive with a three-story Spiegeltent.”
The long-forgotten space was uncovered during a recent renovation at the hotel, which is housed in a historic 1926 downtown building adjacent to the Oriental Theatre. The space was once used as a site for Masonic rites, according to a spokesperson.
Tickets start at $123 (including four-course meal). A special pre-sale begins Nov. 26 at ZinZanni.com/Chicago. General onsale begins Dec. 7.
