My friend Delia looked at me as we waited for our Lyft outside the Goodman Theatre, and said she didn’t envy me for having to review The Attic: Things I’ve Seen While Lying on My Back. I told her I was tempted to title the review simply “WOW!” and make it entirely a compendium of superlatives. And, though I have obviously chosen a different tactic, that might have proven a perfect way to let you know the one essential truth I need to convey: this is a phenomenal production unlike anything you have ever seen; miss it at your own peril, as it will be talked about for years to come.
This combination of memoir, circus, musical, dance, acrobatics, and narrative owes a lot to Cirque de Soleil, and in fact its creator, Shana Carroll, a founder of The 7 Fingers troupe that Goodman Artistic Director Susan Booth has welcomed into the Albert Theatre, is a former Cirque trapeze artist. But The Attic is not trying to be Cirque; there are similarities, sure, but this is a totally new invention. The 7 Fingers, which has been featured on Broadway in such shows as Pippin and Water for Elephants, is a collective of amazing artists who have adapted circus craft to story-telling without Cirque’s trademark spectacle, and here they are showing us highlights of the life of Carroll, one of their founders.
Carroll, now retired from performing herself and fighting what she acknowledges is “advanced cancer,” is a gifted poet, director, and choreographer, and her troupe of circus-trained performers, here fronted by acclaimed Chicago actress Tyler Meredith (playing an unnamed Carroll), takes us on such an emotional and powerful journey that this gorgeous play is one I would gladly see again and again and again.
Meredith’s opening line, repeated often throughout the show, reflects a trapeze artist’s greatest fear: “I fell once.” We are told later that falling is something that every circus person knows will happen at some point, and that the important thing is to know how to fall without getting too hurt. She tells us that trapeze artists are very conscious that they are always falling a little bit and are constantly in conversation with their hands to know just how tight their grips must be so they can continue to fly and make it seem effortless. This show is full of moments that illustrate this illusion of ease.
The subtitle of the show, “Things I’ve Seen While Lying on My Back,” is not necessarily about the aftermath of that fall. Also frequently repeated, the phrase takes Carroll through such moments as being a child looking for shooting stars or lying in bed staring at the solar system decals on her ceiling or being an adult lying in a hospital bed looking at her baby for the first time or at the faces of medical staff after her diagnosis. These moments, we are shown, are not in any essential way different. While lying on her back in each of these circumstances and more, Carroll saw her world and her life.
The show highlights that view throughout, but I will mention two specific examples. On a stories-high projection screen we see, almost constantly, a live camera view of what is happening onstage, right from the middle of the action, but on one occasion the video photographer lies centerstage, shooting straight up as one member of the troupe (Melvin Diggs) whirls and swirls high above him, and the view is transfixing. (Carroll says that she often watches her performers this way when her neck starts to hurt from looking up at them.) There is also a moment later in the play when several audience members are escorted onstage by the performers and, along with them, lie on their backs, looking up as magic happens above them.
I’m writing a lot of words here, and I’ve already stated that words cannot capture the dynamic beauty of this play, but let me take a moment to mention the performers by name because not to do so after they have so transported me would be a crime against art. Along with Diggs, the company has three other men, Fran Alvarez, Santiago Rivera Laugerud, and Eduardo de Azavedo Grillo. Female cast members include, in addition to Meredith, Kalani June, Anna Kichtchenko, Lucy Tan, Alexandra Royer, and Nancy Luna. Trying to discuss what each of these stunning performers brings to the show through juggling, hoops, trapeze, silks, flying, tumbling, creating human towers, etc., along with their many tender, sweet moments together, would not only be utterly futile but would risk overlooking something awesome.
I will, however, point out two specific scenes, both showstopping, as most scenes in this show are. At one point, the show focuses on Royer’s stunning skills on the high rings, as she glides back and forth across the stage, twisting and turning and spinning and contorting herself as she flies, before sharing an intimate moment with Meredith back on the floor. Later, playing Carroll directly, Kichtchenko lies on a raised hospital bed, clearly frightened and writhing in pain and fear, as she tries with increasing desperation to get away only to be blocked by disembodied hands with every move…Carroll’s fears made visceral.
As to Meredith, the glue holding all of this together and our guide through these scenes from Carroll’s life, she is enthralling. With a hospital gown covering her simple white dress, she invites us to experience all of the joys, memories, pain, growth, and pleasure of a life being depicted all around her by the talented 7 Fingers troupe, the life of the play’s creator, whose onstage appearance on opening night elicited long and well-deserved applause. This is not simply a play: it is an event not to be missed, and it is utterly unforgettable.
The Attic: Things I’ve Seen While Lying on My Back is now playing at The Goodman Theatre, 170 N. Dearborn, Chicago, until October 4, 2026. Performance times vary; check the website. Find more information about current plays on our Current Shows page and at theatreinchicago.com.