Short Takes: Press Comments on Joanie’s Direction

"...thrillingly acted by six men under the bristling direction of Joanie Schultz "
--Hedy Weiss on good to you, part of the Collaboraction Sketchbook, June 4, 2007

“Fortunately, director Joanie Schultz knows how to sculpt this unruly but often bleakly funny material into something that hovers between gritty realism and liminal dream state.”
--Kerry Reid in the Chicago Tribune on Stone Cold Dead Serious, January 20, 2007

“The playwright couldn’t ask for a smarter, more nuanced production than the one Joanie Schultz directs, a world premiere.  Like a handful of other great young directors in town, she can coax seemingly effortless performances that have titanic effects.  Her cast waste no energy on embellishment—character walks, forced accents—but devote their full attention to the shifts in relationships that make up the play’s action.  And like Garcés, Schultz understands the dramatic power of concealment.  Her actors spend their time making their true emotions and intentions—just as most people do in daily life.
”The performers have dug so deeply into their characters that they have no need of actorly gimmicks.  And they never neglect Garcés’ well honed script, giving his rapid-fire sentence fragments an unmistakable musicality.  Scenes build, creating clearly define arcs.  There’s craft in nearly every moment, lending even the most horrifying of them a kind of beauty.
“This is the sort of intelligent, passionate work one sees only rarely, even on the biggest stages in town.  And if this pickup band of unfounded twentysomethings hole dup in a tiny storefront can act circles around our best-paid, best-rehearsed casts, one need never fear for the life of the theater.” 
--Justin  Hayford in the Chicago Reader on Acts of Mercy January 25, 2002

“Director Joanie Schultz has set the play at a brisk pace and done a fine job of revealing its buried heart”
--Hedy Weiss on Stone Cold Dead Serious in the Chicago Sun Times January 19, 2007

“It’s directed by Joanie Schultz with palpable simplicity and care…”
–Chris Jones in the Chicago Tribune on tell her that, part of the Collaboraction Sketchbook June 7, 2002

“Director Joanie Schultz has found the right tone for the play, bounding easily between the delicate and the roughhouse.”
--Hedy Weiss on En Mortem in The Chicago Sun Times September 9, 2003  

"A phenomenal and gut-wrenching performance, with the kind of vision that reminds you why theater matters——Joanie Schultz’s interpretation of Adam
Rapp’s grotesque, terrifying play brings to life a Biblical plague/rapture meets sci-fi apocalypse while simultaneously anchoring the fable in a chillingly realistic basement apartment during a hot summer in Joliet "
--Monica Westin on Faster in New City March 25, 2008

“Schultz’s clever physical Staging”
–Kerry Reid on Night Visions in the Chicago Reader April 13, 2001

“And the Flush Puppy actors, under the aptly hallucinatory direction of Joanie Schultz, have given themselves over to this strange music with complete conviction.”
–Hedy Weiss in the Chicago Sun Times on Polaroid Stories August 6, 2002

 “Director Schultz attacks with high energy and a stylish staging eye”
--Jonathan Abarbanel on En Mortem for Windy City Times September 10, 2003

 “But mostly director Joanie Schultz affirms the play’s value by tracing genuine human connections; her subtle, almost balletic staging brings sweat and dirt and blood to an otherwise impassive script”
–Nick Green for the Chicago Reader on Polaroid Stories, August 16, 2002

“Schultz’s artistic touches…serve to ground the author’s viewpoints.”
--Kris Vire on Betty’s Summer Vacation in Time Out, September 14, 2006  

"If tragedies can be enjoyed, this show is an irresistible pleasure because of eight astonishing singers who can act."
-Mary Jane Doerr on Carmen in The Petoskey News-Review August 7, 2008