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  • APTP and Third Rail Projects: Immersive Theater in 6 days or less

    Watson Zhou

    Already in less than 72 hours, APTP’s home theater and ensemble has transformed—school desks fill the building, furniture is dispersed across the theater, APTP teens interact with rooms and objects as though they are fellow actors, and the entire Eugene Field Park field house (which houses APTP) is evolving into a multi-floor, multi-room performance space. This week, APTP hosts New York’s Third Rail Projects to learn the art of immersive theater. By Saturday (less than 72 hours from now), APTP and Third Rail will reveal the original 40-minute performance experience they have co-created in just five days.

  • APTP Announces Immersive Theater Project

    David Feiner

    Albany Park Theater Project (APTP), Chicago’s award-winning, multiethnic, youth theater ensemble, announces the launch of the company’s first-ever immersive theater project. The two-year project is expected to culminate in 2016 with APTP’s premiere of a large-scale, immersive theater performance, created and performed by youth ensemble members, exploring the theme of education, and taking place throughout the classrooms, hallways, offices, bathrooms, gymnasium, locker rooms, lunchroom – and, yes, even the theater – of a school. To kick off the project this summer, APTP will bring to Chicago the award-winning and widely acclaimed Third Rail Projects (TRP), creators of the long-running Then She Fell in New York. During a weeklong residency at APTP this August, TRP will train teen artists in the fundamentals of site-specific, immersive performance.

  • ‘God’s Work,’ Reinvented (Kerry Reid, Chicago Tribune)

    Watson Zhou

    Three teenage boys leap, roll off each other’s backs and clap hands in the air as they kill unseen bees, tallying up their respective body counts with shouts of glee.

    “Caleb! Three bees.”

    “Jeremiah! Two bees.”

    “Luke. Four bees!”

    Their joy is infectious, but with a dark undertone. These actors are rehearsing “God’s Work” — a devised piece originally created and performed by the youth-oriented, multiethnic Albany Park Theater Project in 2006, and now running in a re-imagined version at the Goodman’s Owen Theatre.

  • The Making of God’s Work

    David Feiner
    Lizbeth Acevedo (center) and APTP ensemble members rehearse a scene from God's Work. (Photo: Liz Lauren)

    God’s Work began in a storytelling circle at our theater on Chicago’s northwest side, a space that is equal parts creative laboratory and second home for APTP’s youth ensemble members and adult artists alike.

  • Meet the Cast of God’s Work

    Watson Zhou
    Meet the Cast of God’s Work

    God’s Work features a multiethnic cast that ranges in age from 14 to 18 and will surely be one of the most diverse ensembles on any Chicago stage this spring.

  • APTP Discovers the World of Puppetry

    Watson Zhou
    APTP Discovers the World of Puppetry

    You blink twice to make sure you’re not seeing things—the little toes and dimpled chin, youthful curiosity and playful humor. You begin to see how an object can be given life and personality. This isn’t an actor, but it is much more than a prop. In God’s Work, APTP is discovering the world of puppetry, and in the process, Baby Rachel—both the character and the puppet—has been born.

  • “Rehearsing for Life: Albany Park Theater Project Is Back at The Goodman”

    New City

    A man stands alone at the end of a long runway, unable to move. On the other side are his three children and, in the middle, perch two threatening immigration officers. Each kid primally clamors to reach their father, ducking under the arms of officials, attempting to psych them out with strategy and unabashed love and determination. In this optimistic short story, they succeed, and the final searing image is a parent and child’s tightly clasped hands.

  • Play focuses on life of undocumented workers

    David Feiner

    The struggles of undocumented immigrants take center stage in a revival of a play based in Chicago’s Northwest Side. The Albany Park Theater Project tells the story of day laborers, and a teen struggling without a Social Security number. Chicago Public Radio’s Lynette Kalsnes has this report.

  • “The immigrant experience, as Chicago teens see it”

    Chicago Sun-Times

    The collection of languages spoken by the young performers in “Saffron” – the new show by the nationally recognized Albany Park Theater Project set to debut this weekend as part of the Children’s Humanities Festival – could easily keep the translation department of the United Nations busy.