The theater season once was a September-to-May affair, not counting summer stock barns and tents. But those days are gone. It's not just air conditioning that's made the urban playhouse a year-round place to go, but changing social patterns and audience expectations. In Chicago, that means the downtown Broadway houses offer touring shows all through the hot months, while many subscription houses--including such leadership troupes as the Goodman, Steppenwolf, and Marriott theaters--open new productions in late June or July.

Recently opened productions at the Goodman and at the tiny Writers' Theatre in suburban Glencoe have us revisiting history. In Nixon's Nixon at the Writers' Theatre, we[...]