Talking Heads frontman, Broadway innovator and all-around creative polymath David Byrne is once again blurring the line between art and science, this time in the middle of downtown Chicago. Opening in March 2026 inside the historic Reid Murdoch Building at 333 N. LaSalle Street, Theater of the Mind is Byrne’s latest experiment in perception, identity and theatrical immersion—and yes, it’s happening inside a real office space.
Created with writer and philanthropist Mala Gaonkar, the 15,000-square-foot experience invites audiences of just 16 at a time to explore a series of rooms designed to mess with your senses and make you question, well, yourself.
“You experience the unreliability of your senses, and therefore your own memories and identity,” Byrne told WBEZ. “By the end of the show, you realize that’s what allows us to change and evolve.”
Each 75-minute journey will be led by a guide named (what else?) David. None of them will look like Byrne, though they’ll all be dressed like he was at age two. (Yes, really.)
“I’m not in the show,” Byrne clarified. “But the guides are all called David. None of them look anything like me, but they are dressed the way I was dressed when I was 2 years old.”
The experience, directed by Elmhurst native Andrew Scoville, first debuted in Denver in 2022 and comes to Chicago as part of the Goodman Theatre’s centennial season.
Susan V. Booth, the Goodman’s artistic director, said the decision to stage Byrne’s surreal production in an unconventional space was about reimagining what theater could be.
“We have this conventional notion of how theater works—you come in, sit in the purple velvet seats, then there’s people performing for you,” she said. “What if we turned that on its head and said, ‘This, too, is theater.’”
Alongside the disorienting illusions and philosophical twists, Theater of the Mind will feature a disco room with one original Byrne “banger” (according to Scoville), plus a post-show café and bar where guests can process whatever just happened to them.
Byrne hopes the Chicago production becomes a new kind of landmark. “Our hope is that this becomes a kind of destination for people who live here, but also for tourists who visit,” he told Block Club Chicago. “That this is one of the things you have to do in Chicago.”
Tickets go on sale on November 7 via the Goodman Theatre.