Key Takeaways
- You Can’t Fake The Funk: A Journey Through Funk Music is a 28-song revue tracing funk from James Brown through Parliament-Funkadelic and Earth, Wind & Fire, running September 5–October 25, 2026 at Black Ensemble Theater in Chicago.
- The production features a live nine-piece band, specific cast portrayals of funk legends, and a two-act structure lasting about two hours and ten minutes.
- Standard tickets are $69, with a $59 rate for seniors 65+ and ages 17 and under; a 5-Play Card package offers savings for repeat attendees.
- Performances follow a weekend schedule with Friday 7 PM, Saturday 2 PM and 7 PM, and Sunday 2 PM shows, plus select Sunday evening performances.
- OnesToWatch Live will continue covering funk’s living legacy and the artists carrying the tradition forward in 2026.
Get Tickets For Upcoming Performances
You Can’t Fake The Funk tickets are available online, by phone, and at the Black Ensemble Theater box office. Use the direct links below for fast purchase.
Get Tickets To You Can’t Fake The Funk
Upcoming September 2026 Ticket Links
The following dates have ticketing available. The full run extends beyond these dates through October 25, 2026. Below are the upcoming performances with direct ticket links.
Friday, September 25, 2026
You Can’t Fake The Funk: A Journey Through Funk
Black Ensemble Theater, Chicago, IL
Get Tickets For Friday, September 25
Saturday, September 26, 2026
You Can’t Fake The Funk: A Journey Through Funk
Black Ensemble Theater, Chicago, IL
Get Tickets For Saturday, September 26, 2 PM
Get Tickets For Saturday, September 26, 7 PM
Sunday, September 27, 2026
You Can’t Fake The Funk: A Journey Through Funk
Black Ensemble Theater, Chicago, IL
Get Tickets For Sunday, September 27
Note: Sunday, September 27 also carries an additional 7:00 PM performance, along with select other Sunday evenings throughout the run (October 11 and October 25).
Full September And October 2026 Performance Calendar
The production began previews on Saturday, September 5 at 7:00 PM, with additional previews September 6 at 2:00 PM, September 11 at 7:00 PM, and September 12 at 2:00 PM and 7:00 PM. The opening for You Can’t Fake the Funk was Sunday, September 13, 2026, at 2:00 PM.
Those preview and opening dates have now passed. The remaining performances follow this weekly pattern:
- Fridays at 7:00 PM
- Saturdays at 2:00 PM and 7:00 PM
- Sundays at 2:00 PM, with select 7:00 PM Sunday performances on September 27, October 11, and October 25
The run closes October 25, 2026. For You Can’t Fake the Funk: A Journey Through Funk Music at Black Ensemble Theater, there are no performances on Sunday, October 4 at 7:00 p.m., Friday, October 16 at 7:00 p.m., or Sunday, October 18 at 7:00 p.m.
What The Show Delivers: Production Overview
Daryl D. Brooks’s You Can’t Fake the Funk was originally staged in 2019 and revived in 2026 as part of Black Ensemble Theater’s 50th-anniversary season of greatest hits. Black Ensemble Theater bills its 2026 production of You Can’t Fake the Funk: A Journey Through Funk Music, running September 5–October 25, 2026, as a world premiere, even though the show reworks Brooks’s 2019 concept. In April 2026, Daryl D. Brooks was promoted to Artistic Director of Black Ensemble Theater, succeeding founder Jackie Taylor in that artistic role while Taylor remains with the theater as Founder and CEO.
The revue runs approximately two hours and ten minutes across two acts. Dwight Neal leads the cast as Dr. Funk, a narrator who guides the audience through funk’s golden age from the Civil Rights Movement through the 1960s, 70s, and 80s. He first played the role in the 2019 production.
Setlist And The Canon: 28 Songs Across Funk’s Defining Era
The Black Ensemble Theater revue You Can’t Fake the Funk: A Journey Through Funk Music opens with James Brown, beginning its chronological survey of 28 funk songs with his work. The show traces Brown’s evolution from 1958’s “Please, Please, Please” to 1967’s “Cold Sweat,” often cited as the first true funk song. The 28-song program spans legends including George Clinton, Sly Stone, James Brown, The O’Jays, Earth, Wind & Fire, The Gap Band, Rick James, and Curtis Mayfield.
Specific songs performed in You Can’t Fake the Funk include “Dance to the Music,” “Skin Tight,” “Brick House,” “September,” “Shaft,” “Give Up the Funk,” “Love Rollercoaster,” “Let’s Groove,” “You Dropped the Bomb on Me,” “Word Up,” “I’d Rather Be With You,” “Car Wash,” “Candy,” “Bustin’ Out,” “Atomic Dog,” and the grand finale “Flashlight!” The first act closes with Earth, Wind & Fire’s “September.” These songs are brought to life by an ensemble cast portraying specific funk legends.
Cast As Funk Icons
The ensemble cast portrays named funk artists rather than generic characters. Darrow Richmond plays James Brown in Black Ensemble Theater’s You Can’t Fake the Funk, and Brandon Lavell plays Bootsy Collins. Jaitee Thomas plays Rick James in the ensemble cast of Black Ensemble Theater’s You Can’t Fake the Funk, and Vincent Jordan plays Maurice White of Earth, Wind & Fire in the ensemble cast of Black Ensemble Theater’s You Can’t Fake the Funk: A Journey Through Funk Music. Darren Patin plays Larry Blackmon, and Johnathon Lee plays Sly Stone.
Dwight Neal plays Dr. Funk, the narrator, in Black Ensemble Theater’s “You Can’t Fake the Funk (A Journey Through Funk Music)” and also portrays George Clinton. Britt Edwards, Jordan Taylor, and Miciah Lathan perform as The Mary Jane Girls. Lathan also takes on Chaka Khan, and Taylor portrays Gwen Dickey, who sang “Car Wash.” Understudies are Blake Reasoner and Kentrell Dawson.
The Live Band
Music Director Robert Reddrick leads the band on drums, with Adam Sherod (keys), Oscar Brown (guitar), Charles “Chip” DuBose (guitar), Walter Harrington (bass), Mark Allen Felton (sax), Corey Wilkes (trumpet), Bill McFarland (trombone), and Myron Cherry (drum understudy). The live instrumentation is central to the production’s sound and feel. Funk’s groove-first ensemble approach, where the bassist locks with the kick drum and the rhythm guitar’s offbeat chop creates tension, depends on musicians reacting in real time. Recorded backing tracks cannot fully reproduce that interaction.
Creative Team And The Mothership Homage
The creative team extends beyond Brooks as writer and director. It includes Denise Karczewski (set and lighting design), Bob Kuhn (costumes), Dawn Bless (wigs), Christopher Chase Carter (choreography), Robin DaSilva (vocal arranger), and Qiana McNary as associate director, along with Jackie Taylor (producer), Robert Reddrick (music director), Sean Alvarez (sound designer), DJ Douglass (projection designer), Harrison Orneals (technical director), Kristi Martens (stage manager), and Cat Andrade (assistant stage manager).
Denise Karczewski’s set for Black Ensemble Theater’s 2019 production of You Can’t Fake the Funk features a Mothership set piece that alludes to George Clinton and Parliament-Funkadelic’s concerts. It functions as a theatrical spaceship and time machine rather than a literal replica of the P-Funk stage prop, echoing the space-age possibilities of funk that Clinton embodied.
Ticket Pricing And Purchase Options
Standard tickets to You Can’t Fake The Funk at Black Ensemble Theater are $69 with fees included, per the theater’s box office listing. Reduced pricing of $59 is available for seniors 65 and older and for ages 17 and under, with proof of age required.
Black Ensemble Theater also offers a 5-Play Card digital ticket package for $280 including fees, a savings of $65 over regular ticket prices, valid for 18 months and active immediately after purchase, with a maximum of five tickets redeemable on a single show date. Tickets are also available by phone at (773) 769-4451 and at the box office at 4450 N. Clark Street.
Purchase Tickets Directly Online
Venue Details And Neighborhood Context
Black Ensemble Theater Cultural Center at 4450 N. Clark Street opened in 2011 as the company’s first permanent home. The Black Ensemble Cultural Center is a 50,000-square-foot facility that includes a 299-seat main stage, and it sits in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood on the North Side. Valet parking is available for $15, cash only. Black Ensemble Theater is the only African American theater located on Chicago’s culturally, racially, and ethnically diverse North Side, specifically in the Uptown community.
A new 150-seat flexible Studio Theater is under construction on the second floor of the Black Ensemble Cultural Center at 4450 N. Clark St. as the second phase of Black Ensemble Theater’s Free to BE Village development, with an expected fall 2026 opening.
50th Anniversary Season Context
Black Ensemble Theater was founded in 1976 by producer, playwright, and actress Jackie Taylor with a mission to eradicate racism and its damaging effects on society through theater arts and community engagement. The company has produced more than 100 productions, employed more than 5,000 artists, and serves more than 10,000 young people each year through its Educational Outreach Programs.
The theater received a Special Equity Award at the 2025–2026 Joseph Jefferson Awards for Equity Theater, celebrating its 50-year legacy. The 50th Anniversary Season continues after You Can’t Fake The Funk with Jackie Taylor’s The Other Cinderella, running December 12, 2026 through January 24, 2027.
Funk’s Living Lineage: 2026 Artists Carrying The Tradition Forward
The canon You Can’t Fake The Funk stages functions as a living tradition. A Bass Culture Music Magazine feature by Dubmatix titled “The Sounds of New Funk: Keeping the Flame Alive” argues that funk’s late-1980s commercial decline was a dispersal. Musicians moved into studios, churches, music schools, and bedrooms, then returned from the early 2010s onward as artists who absorbed the tradition deeply enough to extend it into new territory. As Dubmatix writes: “They are not trying to revive something that died. They are continuing something that never stopped.”
Several contemporary acts demonstrate this continuity directly:
Vulfpeck formed in Ann Arbor, Michigan in 2011. The group built an audience largely through the Internet, including YouTube and a Spotify publicity stunt, and sold out Madison Square Garden on September 28, 2019, becoming one of the first headliners to do so without a manager or top record label. Bassist Joe Dart’s playing has been compared to James Jamerson of the Motown Funk Brothers.
Delvon Lamarr Organ Trio formed in Seattle in 2015. The trio’s debut album Close But No Cigar charted at number one on the US Contemporary Jazz Albums chart.
Butcher Brown and Ghost-Note appear in a broader groove-band conversation. In an August 2026 Amsterdam News interview, Christian McBride named Butcher Brown, Ghost-Note, the Nth Power, the Fearless Flyers, and many others as bands carrying forward the groove-band tradition associated with Kool & the Gang, War, and Earth, Wind & Fire.
ProHoeZak is a Bay Area (East Palo Alto) producer who released the funk album Skate Bounce and Beats in 2026, drawing directly on Parliament-Funkadelic and Zapp & Roger’s late-1970s and early-1980s electro-funk sounds.
The Main Squeeze is an Indiana University-formed quintet that has toured with George Clinton & The Parliament Funkadelic and released their seventh studio album, Panorama, on January 9, 2025, blending funk-rock with atmospheric synthesizers.
Rapsody connects hip-hop and funk lineages. Her 2026 album God Gotta Afro & Gold Hoops includes the track “OMG! (Love to Sun Ra)” featuring George Clinton, a direct link to Parliament-Funkadelic’s frontman and the same tradition the Black Ensemble revue celebrates.
Readers can explore more emerging artists extending these lineages in real time in OnesToWatch’s 2026 Top 30 Artists To Watch.
Critical Reception And Additional Context
The 2026 production has drawn strong notices. Chicago Reader theater and dance editor Kerry Reid called it “a booty-shaking, soul-satisfying journey that frees the ass so the mind can follow.” Around the Town Chicago’s review of You Can’t Fake The Funk (A Journey Through Funk Music), written by Julia W. Rath, described the show as “vibrant, energetic, and highly entertaining” and “a spectacular musical revue.”
Julia W. Rath wrote that “what makes ‘You Can’t Fake the Funk’ truly special is how much heart it has. It feels like a genuine love letter to the artists who originally created these timeless songs.” Let’s Play Theatrical Review also gave the production a highly favorable notice. Black Ensemble Theater received 68 Jeff Award nominations and 14 Jeff Awards, and is nominated in seven categories in the 2025–2026 season.
Patterns And Takeaways For Attending
Several structural facts shape how to approach attending this production. The schedule centers on weekends, with Friday evenings, Saturday matinees and evenings, and Sunday matinees, plus a small number of added Sunday evening performances. The revue functions as canon: cast members portray specific artists by name, the band plays the original arrangements live, and the narrative arc moves chronologically through funk’s development as a genre.
The production also sits inside an institutional milestone, Black Ensemble Theater’s 50th anniversary, which gives the revival additional cultural weight alongside its entertainment value. The funk lineage it stages remains active in 2026, with artists across multiple generations extending the tradition in clubs, theaters, and studios worldwide.
Practical Reader Guidance
As of September 23, 2026, the nearest upcoming performances of You Can’t Fake the Funk are on September 25, September 26, and September 27, 2026, with direct ticket links available. Saturday, September 26 offers two performances, which makes it the most flexible single-day option. Sunday, September 27 carries a standard 2:00 PM curtain and an additional 7:00 PM performance.
Valet parking is available at the venue for $15 cash only. The box office at 4450 N. Clark Street and the phone line at (773) 769-4451 provide additional purchase channels. Attendees seeking reduced pricing should bring proof of age for the $59 senior or under-18 rate. Groups or repeat attendees may find the 5-Play Card ($280 for five tickets, valid 18 months) the most cost-effective option.
Reserve Seats For The Next Available Performance
FAQ
When Does You Can’t Fake The Funk Run At Black Ensemble Theater?
The production runs September 5 through October 25, 2026, at Black Ensemble Theater Cultural Center, 4450 N. Clark Street, Chicago, IL. Previews began September 5, and the opening for You Can’t Fake the Funk was Sunday, September 13, 2026, at 2:00 PM.
What Are The Regular Performance Times?
For the 2026 revival of You Can’t Fake the Funk at Black Ensemble Theater, standard curtain times are Fridays at 7:00 PM, Saturdays at 2:00 PM and 7:00 PM, and Sundays at 2:00 PM, with select Sunday 7:00 PM performances. Additional 7:00 PM Sunday performances are scheduled for September 27, October 11, and October 25. There are no performances on Sunday, October 4 at 7:00 p.m., Friday, October 16 at 7:00 p.m., or Sunday, October 18 at 7:00 p.m.
How Can I Buy Tickets?
Tickets for You Can’t Fake the Funk are available at blackensembletheater.org/youcantfakethefunk, by calling the box office at (773) 769-4451, or in person at the Black Ensemble Theater box office at 4450 N. Clark Street, Chicago. The 5-Play Card package costs $280 for five tickets and is valid for 18 months.
What Music Is Performed In The Show?
Black Ensemble Theater’s revival of Daryl D. Brooks’s You Can’t Fake the Funk (A Journey Through Funk Music) is a revue of 28 songs from funk’s golden age, featuring works by George Clinton, Sly Stone, James Brown, The O’Jays, Earth, Wind & Fire, The Gap Band, Rick James, and Curtis Mayfield. Specific songs include “Dance to the Music,” “Give Up the Funk,” “September,” “Flashlight,” “Brick House,” “Car Wash,” and “Bustin’ Out,” among many others. The 2026 revival of You Can’t Fake the Funk at Black Ensemble Theater opens with “One Nation Under A Groove” and closes with a theatrically performed “Flashlight!”
Who Created The Production And Who Is In The Cast?
Black Ensemble Theater’s 2026 revival of You Can’t Fake the Funk: A Journey Through Funk Music is written and directed by Artistic Director Daryl D. Brooks, with Qiana McNary as associate director and Robert Reddrick as music director. The cast is led by Dwight Neal as Dr. Funk, with Vincent Jordan as Maurice White, Johnathon Lee as Sly Stone, Jaitee Thomas as Rick James, Darrow Richmond as James Brown, Brandon Lavell as Bootsy Collins, Darren Patin as Larry Blackmon, Miciah Lathan as Chaka Khan, and Jordan Taylor as Gwen Dickey, among others. The 2026 Black Ensemble Theater revival of You Can’t Fake the Funk is backed by a live band led by music director and drummer Robert Reddrick.
Conclusion
You Can’t Fake The Funk: A Journey Through Funk stages a living tradition. The 28-song arc from James Brown’s “Cold Sweat” to Parliament’s “Flashlight” is performed by a nine-piece live band inside Black Ensemble Theater’s 50th Anniversary Season revival of You Can’t Fake the Funk, and it connects directly to the work of artists like Vulfpeck, Delvon Lamarr Organ Trio, Butcher Brown, and ProHoeZak who are extending that same tradition in 2026. For You Can’t Fake The Funk at Black Ensemble Theater, the September 25–27, 2026 weekend is the next available window with direct ticketing, with performances listed on Fri 25 Sep, Sat 26 Sep, and Sun 27 Sep 2026. OnesToWatch will continue to track the artists and productions that keep funk’s story moving.