Taking the thought that theater can be a magical experience one step farther, Chicago Children’s Theatre’s Goodnight Moon The Musical is full of actual honest to goodness stage magic. In this frenzied adaptation of Margaret Wise Brown’s incredibly popular children’s book, props fly, beds breathe and a friendly family of bears slides out of a wall to play musical chairs.

Of course, children and parents alike can relate to all the schemes that the classic main character, Bunny, utilizes to draw out his bedtime. From requests for stories and songs to the classic need for a glass of water, Bunny and his friend Mouse try everything they can to stay awake. Needless to say, most youngsters will not be helping a timid cow find the courage to jump over the moon or wind up playing games with characters from the paintings on their walls. But having the fantastical events that they have pictured in their minds come to actual life on stage is the major charm of this energetic piece for children – and for everyone still embracing the child in their hearts, as well.

Even with a stage filled with acrobatic splendor by director David Kersnar, Chad Henry’s lively book does seem a bit padded at times. The business is all heart filled silliness, though, and only the most faithful devotees of Wise Brown’s work will find any exception with it. There can be no fault found with Jacqueline and Richard Penrod’s set design. The two bring a colorful museum quality expertise to the affair. Ample help is provided from Alison Siple’s vibrant costumes and Sarah Hughey’s always appropriate lighting cues.

As Bunny, Alex Goodrich is an elastic delight. He is met full on by Becky Poole’s ecstatic mouse. In fact, Poole finds so many quirky underlying motivations to her character that she practically steals the show. Both are given loving, full bodied support by co-stars, Sara Sevigny and Aaron Holland.

Goodnight Moon The Musical runs through December 23 at the Victory Garden’s Biograph Theater, 2433 N. Lincoln Avenue. Tickets are $26-$36 and can be purchased by calling 773-871-3000 or by visiting chicagochildrenstheatre.org. – Brian Kirst

Writer/director Alexander Payne has a track record of wowing critics with unapologetically independent films that seem to speak singularly to upper/middle class adults over 30 (Sideways, About Schmidt). The Descendants is probably his best. It’s funny, it’s heart wrenching, and it’s honest. It’s the antidote to the spectacle-for-kids movies that also came out this weekend.

Matt King (George Clooney, The Ides of March) is forced to try to control his two unruly daughters when his wife, Elizabeth, suffers a devastating accident landing her in a coma. When his teenage daughter (Shailene Woodley, The Secret Life of the American Teenager) reveals that Elizabeth was having an affair prior to her coma, Matt tries to find out as much as he can about the other man while helping his daughters, friends, and family through their grief over Elizabeth’s condition. At the same time, he has to deal with one of the most important real estate deals of his life, as he’s the trustee over a vast acreage of untouched Hawaiian coastland.

I just read that back; it sounds boring and depressing. It is absolutely the opposite of that. Clooney has never been better. Matt King is a normal guy, with a lot of money and way too much on his plate. I don’t think Clooney’s ever played this vulnerable before, and watching him try to keep it together as his world falls apart is spellbinding. The supporting cast is outstanding. Early on, Payne made the very visible decision to use some non-actors in small supporting roles, which is a little distracting, but by the time recognizable actors start showing up it’s full speed ahead. Even the little girl playing Clooney’s youngest gives kind of a stilted performance, but I’m willing to bet she was cast on one scene, and on that she knocked it out of the park. I’m going to blame the minutes upon minutes of expository voice over in the beginning on the fact that this was based on a novel, but it’s the only weak part in what’s probably going to be The Help’s main competitor for Best Adapted Screenplay this year. The writing isn’t flashy, but it’s honest, it’s adult, it’s complex, and courageously quiet (Once the narration gets out of the way). And incredibly, one of Payne’s co-writers is Jim Rash, who plays Dean Pelton on Community. That alone should be enough to buy a ticket. If the riveting human drama isn’t enough to get you to the theater, the cinematography of the film also acts as a motion brochure for why we all need to go to Hawaii. Even though Matt King tells us that Hawaii isn’t an escape from reality, every vista shot in here invites you to paradise.

My personal opinion: The Descendants is Alexander Payne and George Clooney at their best. It shouldn’t be missed. —Jake Jarvi

Whether you love country music or not, The Doyle and Debbie Show, currently running at The Royal George Cabaret, is surefire entertainment. Unlike most Saturday Night Live skits, this often hilarious production doesn’t run out of steam at the midpoint either. The laughs keep coming throughout the entire evening.

Recovering from a prolonged stint of alcoholic inebriation and the massacre of his finances, due to multiple alimony payments, country legend Doyle Mayfield is out on the road again with a new partner. Much like R n B legend Herb, who had multiple female singers performing as Peaches, Doyle has discovered a single mother with a brilliant voice in a roadside dive and has deemed her his new ‘Debbie’.  As the audience witnesses one of their comeback concerts, filled with such humorous masterpieces as “Whine, Whine, Twang, Twang” and “Snowbanks of Life”, Doyle slowly begins to lose his battle with the bottle while tabloid loving Debbie threatens to quit if the sloshed master unleashes the contents of his long dad father’s favorite box one more time.

Creator Bruce Arnston, who gained some fame working with Jim Varney’s Ernest incarnation in the 80’s, obviously loves such tortured music couples as George Jones and Tammy Wynette, but his rubbery humor appeals to music lovers of all universes. Indeed, Arnston as Doyle and Jenny Littleton as Debbie, have garnered acclaim not only from such Opryland members as Jones but from the likes of Conan O’Brien, as well.

As Doyle, Arnston charms with suave humor and a debauched, egoless energy. Littleton, meanwhile, shines with an apocalyptically beautiful singing voice and a nervously straightforward characterization. One truly believes that she has just been plucked from the halls of obscurity from her blank stage stare and slanted stance. Both artists, who have been performing this piece in Nashville since 2006, make this presentation a musical and comedic highlight of the holiday season.

The Doyle and Debbie Show runs through March 18 at the Royal George Cabaret, 1641 N. Halsted Street. Tickets are $43.50-$49.50 and can be purchased by calling 312-988-9000 or by visiting doyleanddebbie.com. —Brian Kirst

Of all the movies I’ve seen this year, Le Havre is without a doubt the biggest waste of time.

Marcel is a down on his luck shoe shiner in France, subsisting basically on credit from the breadmaker downstairs. While his wife is on an extended stay in the hospital fighting terminal cancer, he takes a pursued young African refugee into his home and tries to find a way to smuggle him to London so he can join his mother. His quirky neighbors help him along the way as does an apparently conflicted police officer.

This is a movie completely and utterly devoid of style. The writing is completely wooden, the dialogue is stale and inorganic, and the actors deliver it like children reciting the pledge of allegiance, as a series of syllables that go in a certain order. The characterizations resemble people mostly because they’re played by human beings, but the similarity ends there. Their actions lack all motivation and often defy logic. Scenes seem to exist on the “why not?” principle, characters show up and exchange sentences made up of words that barely affect the plot without a hint of emotion and then they move on to the next quote-“scene”-end quote. And then there’s the look of the picture; It looks as if it was made in the ‘70s by a newspaperman experimenting with a moving picture camera. There’s no attempt to frame anything artfully; the camera is set on a tripod and pointed toward the topic sentence of the scene and then the editor refuses to cut to a new shot until we’re well past being bored. There were a total of six shots in the film where the camera actually moved. Five of them looked pretty good.

The films of director Aki Kaurismäki always make me kind of sad. They get accepted into the Cannes Film Festival and nominated for Academy Awards, but I feel like I must not be seeing the same movies. Critics run around saying that his actors’ deadpan deliveries are so hilarious, like he’s embodying the global perception of the Finnish and serving it up with wry pathos, but shouldn’t the movies themselves be good too? The fact that he gets so much attention in cinematic circles for such shoddy work reminds me of that socially hopeless kid in high school that the cool kids hang out with as a joke. He’s positive they actually think he’s cool while they try to keep their snide chuckles hidden behind their hands.

My personal opinion: This wouldn’t even be worth it if they filmed it digitally. The fact that they wasted 35 millimeter film stock on it is like a slap in the face. —Jake Jarvi