“Victory of the people” is the rallying cry of Cole Theatre, a new company from Chicago-based actors Boyd Harris and Layne Manzer. So it’s a bit ironic that the group’s inaugural production is Mike Leigh’s Ecstasy, whose downtrodden working-class characters would seem anything but victorious. Tormented yet enjoyable characters are a trademark for Leigh, who carves with precision heroin addicts, smoking asthmatics, and slowly drowning alcoholics. Kidwell’s Jean drags gin around her sad-looking bedsit like it’s a security blanket....

Q I am a genetic male with recurrent questions about my gender identity. Straddling desires to maintain my stature in the professional world, keep my wife at my side, and become who I feel like I am, I have experimented with cross-dressing, chastity, antiandrogens, and, prior to all that, steroids. While the matrimonial veto has been enacted for some feminine expressions, my wife and I have reached a middle ground where I can pursue sexual and aesthetic androgyny....

Roots Handmade Pizza 1924 W. Chicago Runner-Up Wishbone Restaurant

Runner-Up Pilsen

Mighty Chicago noise-rock outfit Melkbelly, named “Best cross between the Breeders and Lightning Bolt” in the Reader‘s recent Best of Chicago issue, are dropping new tunes! On Thu 7/2 they’ll release a seven-inch called “Bathroom at the Beach” b/w “Piss Wizard,” and this wolf is willing to bet it’s gonna kick a metric crap-ton of ass. (Thursday is the digital release date—the vinyl might take a couple more weeks.) Local label Automatic Recordings is putting out the record, and Automatic founder Aaron Dexter books shows at the Owl (which the Reader just declared “Best 4 AM bar for live music“)....

MARINA CHAVEZ Carlene Carter The music calendar gets fairly quiet the week after Lollapalooza, though “quiet” doesn’t mean silent. If you’re eager to get your live-music grind on this week there are plenty of great shows to see. “You don’t have to be a Tolkien fan to appreciate the Ravinia Festival’s screenings of the last film in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, The Return of the King,” writes Deanna Isaacs....

Chastity main man Brandon Williams grew up in the Toronto suburb of Whitby, roughly 30 minutes away from the big city. There his youth was dominated by church services until he became enamored with punk. At age 14, he began flocking to all-ages venue the Dungeon, in nearby suburb Oshawa, which by all accounts didn’t have the cleanest reputation; when it closed in 2008, Protest the Hero front man Rody Walker told local news site Durham Region that the Dungeon was “one of the dirtiest clubs in all North America,” and pop culture site A....

Rob Scallon doesn’t know how many musical instruments he owns. He has to walk around the Roscoe Village apartment he shares with his girlfriend, Tamara Chambers, to count them. They line the walls of his living room and fill part of his adjacent office: a double-­neck guitar, a purple cello, a white upright bass, a theremin, an electronic drum kit, a guitalele, a sitar, a berimbau, a rusty shovel outfitted with a single string and wired to play like an electric guitar....

Challenged by Trenchermen bartender Jonah Frank to make a drink with schmaltz, kosher rendered poultry fat, Griffin Benko of Lone Wolf wanted to take a road less traveled—it seemed “too easy of a route” to make an infusion with the fat, he said. Moreover, while he was set on creating a seasonal beverage, standards like eggnog or the Tom & Jerry seemed a little tame for winter in Chiberia. Instead, Benko turned to what he considers an “underappreciated” classic cocktail: the warm ale flip, an egg-based drink that’s been taking the chill off since the 1860s....

There’s plenty to do this week that has nothing to do with the Cubs (almost). Here’s some of what we recommend:

“There are a great many folks who are awake, more aware to the injustices,” Ishii continues. “In the American theater field, many of the organizations and certainly many of the individuals are really bringing themselves into a place of education and awareness around equity, diversity, and inclusion, and ultimately, we aim for them to join the revolution in service of social justice.” 8/13-8/18: various times and locations, see website, caata.net, festival pass $75-$400, individual shows $10-$35....

Frederick Wiseman, who turned 84 this week, is one of the great heroes of independent filmmaking. Since 1967, and without once relinquishing his right to final cut, Wiseman has directed 38 documentary features and two filmed theatrical pieces. His films cost next to nothing by Hollywood standards, and few have required crews of more than a dozen people, production and postproduction combined. Also significant are the film’s references to the distant future....

For the People Artists Collective www.forthepeoplecollective.org @ForThePeopleChi Runner-Up Stacey Smith

Thanks to ever-increasing access to technology, the world of podcasting is quickly becoming oversaturated with any and everyone holding opinions and a handy recording device. The ladies of the Nerdette podcast, Tricia Bobeda and Greta Johnsen, stand out amid all the chatter because of their refined radio technique (the two met in the trenches of WBEZ, where Bobeda is a producer) and their uncanny ability to bring out the nerd in everyone: on one episode they discuss science-fiction novels with former NFL punter Chris Kluwe, on another they trade lines from Arrested Development with Denise Kiernan, author of The Girls of Atomic City: The Untold Story of the Women Who Helped Win World War II....

4632 N. Rockwell 773-509-1871 rockwellsgrill.com Runner-Up Wishbone

325 Tudor Ct., Glencoe, 847-242-6000, writerstheatre.org Several Chicago-area theater troupes are developing new facilities right now, but nobody’s got sexier blueprints than Writers Theatre. Once housed in the back of a North Shore bookshop, the 22-year-old Glencoe company will soon break ground on a complex designed by Studio Gang Architects, the outfit headed by MacArthur fellow Jeanne Gang, whose Lakeshore East tower Aqua has been acclaimed worldwide. Under the circumstances—which include the need to hit a $31 million capital campaign goal—you’d think something besides the donors would have to give, that there’d be some slippage in production quality while artistic director Michael Halberstam builds his dream house....

Beth Stelling’s first album, Sweet Beth, couldn’t have been more aptly named; between the former Chicagoan’s toothy smile and her soft delivery she’s the definition of “sweet,” even while joking about her mother’s death virginity and brittle penises. In the past year the LA-based stand-up has been busier than ever, making frequent late-night talk show appearances, honing her 30-minute Comedy Central special (premiering October 10), and popping up in almost virtually every list of up-and-coming comedians....

Sun-Times Print Collection Martha Lavey Martha Lavey will be stepping down after nearly 20 years as artistic director of Steppenwolf Theatre Company and will be succeeded by ensemble member (and Tony-winning director) Anna D. Shapiro in the fall of 2015, the company announced in a press conference at the theater this morning. There were no audible gasps from the balcony, where all the members of the ensemble staff were sitting, which suggested that the change was not unexpected....