Southsiders Meet famous Chicago ghosts in Six Stories Up in Haunted Chicago Weekends Oct. 13-22

Can a bunch of middle school kids solve Chicago’s problems? Find out in Tellin’ Tales Theatre’s Halloween musical written and performed by middle school students and their adult mentors with and without disabilities–including Asha Andrews-Hutchinson of Bronzeville who plays the ghost of Lorraine Hansberry and Di Reed of Austin who plays the ghost of Malcolm X.

Six Stories Up in Haunted Chicago finds kids on a ghost tour that takes a turn toward the scary when they stop at Resurrection Cemetery. They meet famous Chicago ghosts who have a lot to say about the current state of our city. These spirits include Al Capone, John Belushi, Resurrection Mary, Malcolm X, opera singer Mary Garden and playwright Lorraine Hansberry.

The result is a hilarious and often moving musical peppered with personal stories told by students and adults with cerebral palsy, blindness and dwarfism, as well as their non-disabled peers. Six Stories Up in Haunted Chicago is geared toward adults and children age nine and up and runs Friday-Sunday, October 13-22, at Filament Theatre, 4041 N. Milwaukee, in Chicago. Friday and Saturday performances are 7:30 p.m. and Sundays are 2 p.m. Information and tickets ($20 adults/$15 students) are available at tellintales.org.

The show length is approximately 90 minutes with one intermission. The Filament Theatre is ADA accessible and sign language interpretation and audio description will be provided at the Sunday, October 15 show.

The cast and production team of Six Stories Up in Haunted Chicago is an exciting mix of ethnicity and ability. They come from neighborhoods throughout Chicago and the suburbs.

Asha Andrews-Hutchinson of Bronzeville, a 7th grader at Village Leadership Academy, plays the ghost of Lorraine Hansberry, the playwright who authored A Raisin in the Sun. Her adult mentor is Molly Weisman of Elmhurst. Andrews-Hutchinson has taken dance classes at the Chicago Multicultural Dance Center since she was 5 years old, studying African, modern, jazz, tap and contemporary dance.

Di Reed of Austin plays the spirit of Malcolm X and is the adult mentor of 7th grader Miles Wilson of Bolingbrook. Reed performed in the Tellin’ Tales Theatre production of Divercity in 2017, preenting an original solo performance, and is a member of St. Martin’s Episcopal Church in Austin.

Mentors include Stephen Donart, Mary Hobein, Matthew Kopp, Tekki Lomnicki, Di Reed and Molly Wiesman. Ben Saylor will have a cameo role. Apprentices (all middle school students) include Asha Andrews-Hutchinson, Serenity Deida, Josafat Oviedo, Aihua Sprecher, Tiernan Ebrahim Tajalli and Miles Wilson. Lauren Nichols spearheads set design and composer Chris Errera created the original score.

The mission of Tellin' Tales Theatre is to shatter barriers between the disabled and non-disabled worlds through the transformative power of personal story. They bring together children and adults from both communities to share their stories in theatrically innovative productions and programs to promote awareness, understanding and acceptance.

Artistic Director Tekki Lomnicki led storytelling programs for Gallery 37 and After School Matters for over a decade. The idea for the initial Six Stories Up came from her work with these programs, which included students with and without disabilities. Lomnicki, herself a person with a disability, took the process a step further to include adult mentors with disabilities. Six Stories Up in Haunted Chicago is a result of this mix, and strives to remove all barriers between artists, including race, ethnicity, gender, age and ability.