The Hellcab, with its original cast and director, is revving its ignition in Los Angeles on December 1st, but the meter is still running in Chicago, as it has been, continuously, since 1992. Richard Cotovsky, the sixth and most recent of the title vehicle's pilots through the Boschian labyrinth of Christmas Eve in the Big Windy, has the face of a Veronica's Veil and the voice of a field medic in the Hundred Years' War, both of which convey the subtlest of rages and the greatest of compassions.
Freshly directed by Dan Rivkin, after a likewise long and varied series of auteurs, the current production revives the energy, color and originality of the premiere, making for a modern-day Pilgrim's Progress, universally accessible even to citizens to whom taxis are as rare and exotic as rickshaws. And at a running time of a little over an hour, this is the perfect antidote to an overload of post-holiday blues.
