Chicago

The story of Chicago

Set in Chicago during the jazz age, the show follows Roxie Hart, a chorus girl wannabe who shoots her lover and lands in the Cook County Jail. There she meets Velma Kelly, a nightclub star awaiting trial for a similar crime, and both women scramble for the attention of the press and the services of a slick, publicity obsessed defense attorney. Rather than playing out as a straight courtroom drama, the story is staged as a series of vaudeville turns, with each number standing in for a plot beat or a character's private fantasy.

That structure is part of the point. Chicago is a satire about how criminal celebrity gets manufactured, packaged, and sold to a public hungry for spectacle, and it uses the language of old time entertainment to make that argument stick.

The music and the makers

The score comes from composer John Kander, working with longtime collaborator and lyricist Fred Ebb, and it is built almost entirely around the sounds and structures of vaudeville and 1920s jazz. Numbers are styled after specific old school acts and specialties, giving the show a wink and nod quality even as it delivers cutting commentary underneath the glitz.

The songs are catchy, brassy, and built for big, sharp choreography, which has always been central to how the show is experienced in the theater. The bandstand, the bowler hats, and the sultry unison movement are as much a part of the show's identity as any individual tune.

Chicago on Broadway

Chicago has become one of the defining titles of the modern Broadway landscape, admired for its lean, stylish staging and its willingness to needle the audience's own appetite for scandal. Its themes of media manipulation and the cult of celebrity have only grown more resonant with time, which helps explain why the show keeps finding new audiences decade after decade.

Its blend of sardonic humor, sleek dance, and instantly hummable songs makes it a favorite for theatergoers who want style and bite in equal measure, and it remains a staple recommendation for anyone new to musical theater looking for something sharp and fast moving.

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