John Malkovich has a brand-new gig – brand-new to local audiences, that is.
The uncommonly versatile Chicago stage and screen actor, and longtime Steppenwolf Theatre ensemble member, has been engaged by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra to narrate performances of Aaron Copland’s “A Lincoln Portrait” under Riccardo Muti’s direction April 12-17 at Symphony Center.
The subscription series program also holds works by Dvorak and George Walker.
Malkovich is no newcomer to the classical music arena. In January 2015 he began touring worldwide with “Report on the Blind,” a mixed-media performance that combined the actor’s reciting excerpts from a novel by Argentinian writer Ernesto Sabato with a score by Russian composer Alfred Schnittke.
More recently, Malkovich collaborated on a hybrid classical music/theater piece, “The Music Critic,” at the 2017 Ghent Festival of Flanders, in Belgium.