Centerstage - Chicago's Original City Guide

Articles Sections >> Arts + Words Bars + Clubs Dating Festivals Fitness Food Lifestyle Music Theater Travel + Tourism Who's Who > View All Theater Guides

Sure to cure your work-induced summertime blues and send you back to the office on Monday still chuckling.

Wednesday Jun 09, 2004.     By Freda Moon

Theater Feed

Donny’s Skybox Theater
Secondcity.com
tickets: (312) 337-3992
Sundays through June 27

cc: Jim from Accounting is sure to cure your work-induced summertime blues and send you back to the office on Monday still chuckling from its too-true jabs at corporate America. As one half of the Sunday Double Header at Donny’s Skybox, the 40-minute show features reference after punchy reference to corporate and popular culture.

Writers Hanna LoPatin and Michael Walsh and writer-director Larry Majewski steer clear of high-minded humor. Instead, they focus on the day-to-day ridiculousness of life inside the fictional megaconglomerate, U.S.A. Bagel. A cast of five skilled young comedians transition almost seamlessly through six skits and such memorable characters as the new hire, the corrupt corporate tycoon and the girly gay guy who brown-noses his way into his boss’s favor. The stereotypes are well tread and light-hearted and the crassness is unlikely to offend even the most sensitive theater patron.

There’s nothing outrageous in cc: Jim from Accounting, nothing shocking or exceptional, but the performances are solid and the dialogue is belly-laugh funny. LoPatin was perhaps the most impressive, morphing from a seemingly innocent church girl in one scene to a power-wielding, sexually starved executive in the next. Her stint as a snooty and change-resistant Old Town property manager is especially amusing. Duncan Teater was equally hilarious as the hard-ball-drivin’ lawyer, bullshit talkin’ homo and snifflin’ “Mitch the Bitch.” Though there’s no lack of talent in the show, LoPatin and Teater certainly stand out.

Adding to mostly wholesome fun of the show (penis enlargement references aside), the entire cast intermittently bursts into song, harmonizing the subject lines of the day’s interoffice emails to the musical accompaniment of guitarist Grant Gage. “cc: Jim from Accounting” supplants “The Simpsons” as a Sunday night opportunity to be mindlessly and happily entertained without switching on the ol’ boob tube.

The shows start promptly at 8 p.m., so arrive early to find a seat in this small dark theater. Once the lights go out, it’ll be difficult to maneuver your way through the audience. Parking in the Wells and North area is treacherous (unless you’re willing to shell out $6 to $15 for a garage); you’ll be better served by CTA.