Journalist, Author & Syndicated Columnist
Lady Madonna is no stranger to Chicago. She got a good dose of the city when she filmed “A League of Their Own” here in 1991. But when she hits town this time, it’ll be her first concert tour stop as a married mother of two young’uns. Think that’ll cramp her style when she’s here next week for her two sold-out concerts? We doubt it very much.
Forget about 1,000 points of light. Michigan Avenue will glow with a million holiday lights when the ninth annual Magnificent Lights Festival kicks into gear Saturday.
It was a summer of fluctuating temperatures. But Chicagoans made the best of it. Even the city’s notorious humidity didn’t dampen our spirits, not when we could ensconce ourselves in a state-of-the-arthouse theater.
If you think that cute guy you saw heading into Tempo last week looked a lot like Keanu Reeves, there’s a good chance that it was. Reeves has returned to Chicago to film “Hardball.” He first made his presence in the Windy City known four years ago when he shot “Chain Reaction.” You can bet that he’ll be out and about in the city this time around, too.
Carson Pirie Scott’s State Street store was transformed into a TV studio one day last September, when a scene for the hospital drama “Chicago Hope” was shot there. Producers say they like the different exteriors they find while shooting in the Windy City.
If you can’t find something fun to do on a Chicago weekend, then you’re an idiot. So says Mancow Muller, the popular, outspoken morning drive radio personality at WRCX-FM (103.5). For the uninitiated, Muller, 30, is a man who doesn’t weather boredom well either on his radio show or his live rock ‘n’ roll extravaganzas. For instance, at his “Hell-O-Ween Spectacular” last month at the United Center, his sideshow included dozens of lap dancers who took their acts to audience members. Then there was the little matter of feeding time for the 600-pound snake and a little donkey named Danny, but we won’t go there for a bit. So it was with curiosity that the Sun-Times set out to chronicle a typical night out with the popular shock jock.
Aesop Rhim’s love affair with Chicago began 30 years ago when he immigrated from Seoul, South Korea, to earn his master’s degree at IIT’s Institute of Design. Since then, he has had six one-man shows, all about Chicago. “I strive to express my love and vision of Chicago,” said Rhim, who cites Picasso as his biggest influence. “The uniqueness of my work is the interchange of my profession (commercial art) and my expressionist art.” Rhim’s abstract silk-screened work has won the 60-year-old artist some high-powered supporters. Former Gov. Jim Thompson is a fan, as is Mayor Daley, who proclaimed Sept. 20, 1995, “Aesop Rhim Day.”
South Korean artist Sung Hee Cho got her first taste of art when she was 6. Her father bought her water-based paints and taught her to draw Asian characters on delicate rice paper. By junior high school, Cho decided her preference leaned more toward Western art and set her sights on America. Cho didn’t immigrate into the United States right away. She earned a master’s degree in fine arts from the prestigious Ewha Women’s University before relocating to America 16 years ago.