Chicago Shakespeare Theater will stage the world premiere of a new Lauren Gunderson play about the tennis icon Billie Jean King, the theater company announced Wednesday. Also among the highlights of the 2025-26 season on Navy Pier: A refashioned version of the Fats Waller musical “Ain’t Misbehavin,’” an Ethiopian circus, a return visit to Chicago by the Royal Shakespeare Company, new CST productions of Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing” and “The Merry Wives of Windsor,” and the North American premiere of “Brokeback Mountain,” a musical version of the Annie Proulx novel that also inspired the Oscar-winning film.
With Broadway in mind, “Billie Jean” (July 18-Aug. 10) will be directed in The Yard theater by Marc Bruni and has commercial producers already attached. Chicago Shakespeare artistic director Edward Hall said that the piece had been developed in collaboration with the tennis icon herself and has “her imprimatur”; King lived in Chicago for many years.
Also in The Yard, “Ain’t Misbehavin’: The Fats Waller Musical Show” (Sept. 3-28) will be co-directed by the revue’s creator, Richard Maltby, Jr., and André de Shields, a veteran Broadway star. That show, a retooling of a much-produced but dated title, might well move beyond Chicago as well. “Much Ado About Nothing” (Nov. 19-Dec. 21) is expected to feature a Chicago cast and will be directed by Selina Cadell, who previously helmed Eddie Izzard’s solo “Hamlet.” “The Merry Wives of Windsor” (April 2-May 3, 2026), will be helmed by Phillip Breen, directing in Chicago for the first time. “I wanted to bring the most experienced Shakespearean directors I could to Chicago,” Hall said. Hall himself will direct a short version of “Hamlet” (Jan. 27-Feb. 28, 2026), aimed at school groups as well as his own short adaptation of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” (July 19-Aug. 17) which will tour Chicago neighborhoods over the course of this summer.
Britain’s Royal Shakespeare Company will return to Chicago with “Hamnet” (Feb. 10-March 8, 2026) playing in The Yard next winter. “Hamnet” is a piece based on the book by Maggie O’Farrell about Shakespeare’s own offspring, who died as an 11-year-old child, an experience likely formative for a writer who wrote often about familial loss. The Chicago production will be the beginning of a short U.S. tour of the piece.
Also in the Shakespeare-adjacent category: The Q Brothers, now known as the Q Brothers Collective, will stage a new “add-rap-tation” of “Julius Caesar.” “Rome Sweet Rome” will play in the Courtyard Theatre from Sept. 23 through Oct. 19.
Like “Hamnet,” “Brokeback Mountain” (May 28-June 28, 2026) had a previous run in London’s West End. The stage version, headed to Courtyard mainstage, is adapted by Ashley Robinson and features a country and Western-style score by Dan Gillespie Sells. Jonathan Butterell directs.
This coming summer on Navy Pier features “Circus Abyssinia” (July 10-Aug. 3) in the Courtyard, known for telling the story of its creators, Mehari “Bibi” Tesfamariam and Binyam “Bichu” Shimellis.
In the Halloween season, the Chicago writer and A Red Orchid Theatre ensemble member Levi Holloway (“Grey House”) will see the North American premiere in The Yard of his “Paranormal Activity” (Oct. 15-Nov. 2), a thriller based on the movie franchise that also has been produced in the U.K. The show will be directed by Felix Barrett, the founder of the company Punchdrunk, best known for the long-running interactive hit “Sleep No More,” which has yet to be seen in Chicago.
Finally, a lively immersive piece from New Zealand called “Mrs Krishnan’s Party” is set for CST’s Upstairs Studio from April 7-26, 2026. “People will get to eat during the show,” Hall said.
CST has packed this extensive slate of shows into various flexible subscriber options rather than separate seasons. “We’re looking at all the shows holistically,” said executive director Kimberly Motes.
Hall said the theater was “delighted to able to produce this volume of work for Chicago.”
Chris Jones is a Tribune critic.
cjones5@chicagotribune.com
