The Theatre Is A Body Politic

The Reverend Jim Shiflett

The Reverend Jim Shiflett shared the Hull-House philosophy of trying to unite communities through the arts. To that end he founded the Community Arts Foundation in 1966, funded in part by the community Renewal Society, a city based program sponsored by the United Church of Christ. Shiflett convinced the C.A.F. board of directors to buy a building that had housed a bowling alley and slicing machine company at 2257 North Lincoln Avenue, a building that had been slated for demolition.

Reverend Jim (right) and scene partner

Shiflett served as executive director of the new theatre, he hired Bill Russo and Paul Sills as its program directors. He called his new theatre the Body Politic, quoting the British theatre director Harley Granville-Barker who said: "The theatre is a body politic and the art of it a single art, though the contributions must be by many." The name stuck though no resident company would bear that name until the late 1970s. Between 1966 and 1980 a myriad of transient theatre companies would call the Body Politic home.

Paul Sills 

Actors Working on a Scene

Meanwhile, over at The Kingston Mines (the theatre not the blues club), another alumni of Hull-House theatre, Jim Jacobs and his partner Warren Casey had finished their script and score for a musical they called "Grease". It debuted in 1971 as five hour show. Jacobs and Casey expected their show to appeal to just a handful of people. However, producers Ken Waissman and Maxine Fox, seeing the commercial potential of "Grease" convinced Jacobs and Casey to shorten it and smooth out the rough edges and turn it into a Broadway style show.

"The greatest achievement of "Grease" is its perfect deadpan objectivity about everything in it: a d.a. haircut, a new guitar, a missed period, a falsetto backup group, a preposterously accurate hand-jive. It is a loving, funny museum of where we were, perhaps even, when we scream and stomp our feet at it, a gentle attempt to exorcise the parts of ourselves we left back there. A tribute to the many small, stupid things that happened to us during 'the decade when nothing happened'." -Micheal Feingold

A landmark production for Chicago's Off-Loop theatre community it was the first show to make it really big. "Grease" encouraged others to try their luck. Moreover  the success of "Grease" convinced local producers of the commercial of this new theatre market and helped to assure its continuation.