Stranded

"Let's see. Stranded! is a sketch show about a sketch group performing the sketches of a sketch group that got marooned on a deserted island in the 1990s, scribbled down their most prized sketches, and set them afloat in bottles. Talented, cohesive quartet Warm Milk depict the slow disintegration of the 90s troupe, Brain Freeze, as island life gets to them and they start devising bits like the hilariously offensive one in which Huck Finn's Jim wears a fish head so they can call him "Fish" and avoid the n-word. Warm Milk click well throughout, working running jokes into the show with ease and never abandoning Brain Freeze's fantasy of ordering a year's worth of Pizza Hut pizza—well, until the very end. I could've gone for a bit more 90s nostalgia; Sega Genesis and Sonic the Hedgehog just weren't enough. But that's a minor gripe." —Kevin Warwick

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Fuck You, I Love You, Bye: The Rahm Emanuel Story

"Nearly every joke in the first few scenes of Annoyance Theatre's new comedy landed with an artless clunk on opening night. Maybe the cast was rattled, having lost director Paul Turner to a family emergency a week before opening. But once they settled down and found the rhythms in Marc Warzecha and Andy Cobb's biting, imaginative satire, things took off. The hour-long show is set in 2081, when Chicago rules the world thanks to a certain bloodthirsty, erratic, foul-mouthed mayor. Recently deceased, Rahm is presented as an interactive hologram in a Museum of Science and Industry exhibit, reliving his greatest moments--which include adding "Go fuck yourself" to the city seal. It's funny, filthy, politically savvy, and gleefully anti-establishment." --Justin Hayford

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Messing With a Friend

"...will surely be the hottest improv show in town and costs a mere five bucks. Assertive, vulnerable, eloquent, acerbic and ---most important---complicated, Messing is a colossal talent."