Chicago, ho!

Oh, man, it's coming soon: As the Big Quiz Thing continues its campaign of global dominance, we're about to expand to our fourth city. (That's right, folks: We're monthly in a full 4% of the USA's 100 most populous cities.) It's Chicago, the Windy City, live on the first Thursday of every month, starting October 4. The venue is a brutally classy hipster-green restaurant/art gallery/show space called Uncommon Ground, in the Edgewater neighborhood. Check it out:

 

Nice, right? Even nicer: It'll be all the BQT multimedia fun and prizes that fans in NYC, Boston and L.A. have come to know and love, but with a new host: the fantastically talented Katie Vagnino.

Katie should be familiar to Boston fans as B-Cutie Katie, my much-beloved erstwhile stage sidekick who has since relocated to the City of Big Shoulders. (She should also be familiar to lots of people who know me personally as my ex-girlfriend, but that is neither here nor there, at least not these days.) She has a long onstage history as an actor and singer, in addition to her extreme BQT experience, so I can't think of anyone better suited to bring the gospel of quality quiz excitement to the Midwest. Plus, she's a pretty darn cute lady, which can't exactly be said of most quizmasters.

 

We've already attracted some good attention in Paris on the Prairie: Inaugural-show prize sponsors include the famed Adler Planetarium and tickets to the local production of Broadway hit Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson (cowritten and originally directed by Friend of the Quiz Alex Timbers). And we have the $200 grand prize, of course. All indications are that the Big Onion is really going to dig the BQT. Our Kind of Town, indeed.

And yes, I will be making the journey to That Toddling Town for the first show, to help things get up and running and to see the place of my heritage (I've spent only a couple weeks total in Chi-town, though much of my extended family hails from there; my parents' first date was at the original Uno pizza, even).

Details on Uncommon Ground are here; here's the Facebook event. Please spread the word: Tell your Midwestern friends that their quiz prayers are at long last answered.