Introduction: Chicago Theater as Makeshift Performance, Megan E. Geigner, Stuart J. Hecht, and Jasmine Jamillah Mahmoud
Section I: Theater: Artistry Born of Ashes, Stuart J. Hecht
1. Entertaining People: The 1893 Columbian Exposition Midway Plaisance, Rosemarie K. Bank
2. From Marmalade to Gingerbread: The Columbian Exposition, Chicago’s 57th Street Artist Colony, and the Theaters it Spawned, Stuart J. Hecht
3. All Passes – Art Alone Endures: Staging the New Drama at the Fine Arts Building, Shannon Epplett
Section II: From Mainstream to Institutionalized, Megan E. Geigner
4. Pillars of the Community: Reversing the Flow between the Goodman and Immigrant Theater, Megan E. Geigner
5. Theatrical Geographies of Segregation: Spatial Displacement in Theodore Ward’s Big White Fog, Aaron Krall
6. Lincoln Avenue and the Off-Loop Scene: Urban Renewal, and the Early Years of the Chicago Storefront Movement, Cat Gleason
7. Object Permanence: ImprovOlympic and the Legitimacy of Improv in Chicago, Travis Stern
Section III: Centering the Decentered, Itinerant, Civic, and Home, Jasmine Jamillah Mahmoud
8. Reclaiming Space: An Oral History of Teatro Vista, Laura Lodewyck
9. Temple-Swapping in the City: The Spatial Imaginary and Performances of Place-Making in the Work of Theaster Gates, LaRonika Thomas
10. Staging Private Homes and the Transformations of Public Lives: A conversation with Irina Zadov, Laley Lippard, Aymar Jean Christian, and Meida McNeal of the Chicago Home Theater Festival, Jasmine Jamillah Mahmoud
Epilogue: Chicago Theater amidst Pandemics, Megan E. Geigner and Jasmine Jamillah Mahmoud