Perhaps only a reporter could have created the character of Chicago‘s Roxie Hart, a fame-hungry nightclub dancer who kills her lover, then convinces her husband to pay for Chicago’s best defense lawyer to plead her case. When the lawyer, Bill Flynn, helps her crime of passion make celebrity headlines, Hart gets the fame she always longed for–but in jail she finds herself competing for public attention with another vaudeville murderess named Velma Kelly. Chicago (pictured) was written in 1926 by Maurine Dallas Watkins, a newspaperwoman who chronicled the actual events upon which her play (and later the musical) was based. While on the surface Watkins’ script appears to be a criticism of women like Hart and Kelly, the musical pokes the most fun at the ever-escalating media for always having to top last week’s story. Directed and choreographed by Bob Fosse in the ’70s and revived by Walter Bobbie in 1996, Chicago has won oodles of Tony awards, and it comes to UNC-Chapel Hill’s Memorial Hall on Jan. 13 at 8 p.m. Tickets range from $32-$46 for the general public and $22-$26 for students. Call 966-3834.
