Before the experience fades into the gloaming, I’d like to take a moment to pay tribute to the play “Chicago,” as performed over the past two weekends by the Aspen Community Theatre.

Ed Foran’s “Mr. Cellophane” quite rightly got its share of the kudos, but I was amazed at the depth and breadth of the cast, the costumes, the music, the dancing, the set, the staging–and the general feeling of naughty enterprise that kept the evening sailing along from start to finish.

We were lucky because we got the very last seats for last Thursday’s performance–right in the front row, where every bump and grind was right there in your face. The jailbird girls were never less than sensational, with nothing less than complete confidence that the complex staging was always under control, and “Billy Flynn” was even better.

I came away as did so many others asking the obvious question: how could a community theatre pull off such a feat? The friends who came with us had no idea this was anything but a professional theatre company until long after “Chicago” came to a roaring, rocking, raucous close. I think those of us who try to go every year remain amazed when Jason at Explore Booksellers turns out to be a song and dance man of surprising talent. Watching Aspen Community Theatre just like that–faces in the crowd who find center stage, if only for a moment.

A final word on the Aspenomic pulchritude resplendent throughout: a friend in the band said it was all he could do to keep his eyes on the music and not the shimmy-shimmy. That’s “Chicago” for you–and all that jazz.