Jim Rinnert (1944-2025)
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Chicago writer, artist, philanthropist, AIDS activist, longtime art director of In These Times magazine, and active member of Chicago's theatre and LGBT communities James Hubert Rinnert passed away Saturday morning, July 19, 2025, at Beacon Memorial Hospital in South Bend IN due to complications from a stroke. At the time of his death, Jim was 80 years old and living in New Carlisle IN with his husband of 45 years, retired Lyric Opera Director of Finance Brent Fisher.
Jim became involved in Chicago's grassroots theatre scene in the early 1970s. Born in Flora IL, Jim then attended Eastern Illinois University where he was active in the school's theatre program. Jim was drawn into the "Off-Loop Theatre" scene by close friend, classmate and actor J. Pat Miller. It was there that Jim met his lover of 12 years, Tommy Biscotto (who went on to stage manage at the Organic and Goodman theatres). In 1979-1980, Jim collaborated with J Pat Miller and Tommy Biscotto on a highly acclaimed multimedia theatrical work, The Artaud Project, which played at Victory Gardens Theatre (then in its original space, now The Metro). Based on the writings of avant-garde theatre and cinema artist Antonin Artaud, the innovative show combined live performance with video with text by Jim, who also co-directed the show with Victory Gardens’ Artistic Director Dennis Zacek. The show starred J Pat Miller as Artaud, with Tommy Biscotto as stage manager, and went on to win a 1980 Joseph Jefferson Award, along with an Outstanding Performance Award for J Pat Miller. Tribune theatre critic Richard Christiansen said in his review: "Using sound effects, lighting shifts, and an interplay between the live portrayal of Artaud by actor J. Pat Miller and taped scenes shown on four television sets, the 75-minute, intermissionless work puts the performer and the audience through the wringer. The project, shepherded into life over the last few years by director Jim Rinnert, is a complex, . . . compulsively watchable work that offers interested theater audiences the opportunity to experience a genuinely experimental piece." The couple also helped establish an artists' colony on Chicago's Near West Side near their home, but in 1982, Tommy Biscotto was diagnosed with Kaposi's sarcoma (later designated as AIDS), passing away in 1984 with Jim at his bedside. In 1985, J. Pat Miller also died of AIDS-related illness, and Jim helped create the Biscotto-Miller Fund to provide financial support to members of the Chicago theater community impacted by AIDS. In 1987, Jim was part of the committee that organized and produced Arts Against AIDS, a benefit variety show held Second City that raised some $10,000 for the Biscotto-Miller Fund. Jim then went on to take part in establishing the nonprofit Season of Concern Chicago. Originally formed to assist people with AIDS-related illnesses, SOC today provides financial assistance to Chicagoland theater practitioners impacted by illness, injury, or circumstance that prevents them from working. In 2025, Jim recalled: "One of my proudest moments, years later, when a diagnosis of AIDS was no longer a certain death sentence, was when Season of Concern expanded the Fund’s mission . . . to encompass broader health and emergency needs within the community." "Jim Rinnert played a seminal role in shaping the theater community’s response to the AIDS epidemic," says Marcie McVay, former managing director of Victory Gardens. "When the Biscotto-Miller Fund was formed in April of 1985 to help those in the theater community who were suffering from AIDS, Jim was named its first president. Shortly after Season of Concern was founded in 1987, Jim joined the SOC board of directors and later served as its president. When the mission of Season of Concern was expanded to serve anyone in the theater community suffering from debilitating illness, Jim was the president of the organization. Jim had a lifelong commitment to the well-being of the theater community. He will be greatly missed." At the time of his death, Rinnert was working on a book covering the history of the Organic Theater, one of the cutting-edge ensembles that launched the Chicago Off-Loop theater movement. "We agreed to call our forthcoming book on the history of the Organic Theater Scream, Bleed, Take Off your Clothes: Stuart Gordon and Chicago's Organic Theater Company," the book’s coauthors Cordis Heard, Mike Saad, and Mary Griswold. "It was like old times, giving and taking, coming up with something wonderfully collaborative between us—truly Organic. With Jim's editing and writing skills, his smarts and sense of humor guiding us to the finish line, we'll see the book in print from the University of Chicago Press within the next year. We couldn't have done it without him." Jim was also active with In These Times magazine, a Chicago-based, nationally distributed politically progressive magazine of news and opinion, which he joined in 1986. “ (I answered) a help-wanted ad for a typesetter with a start-up socialist tabloid to be called In These Times. I got the job, and by the time we’d finished the prototype issue and were preparing the first edition, I knew I’d found something with a mission and a vision I could believe in and wanted to be part of." An accomplished visual artist, Jim became Art Director of the magazine and worked there for some 30 years, frequently contributing articles. During Jim's tenure at ITT, the magazine published articles by such writers as Kurt Vonnegut, Noam Chomsky, David Moberg, Salim Muwakkil, Joan Walsh, Laura Washington, Alexander Cockburn, and Garrison Keillor. In addition to his husband Brent Fisher, Jim is survived by his brother, Max Rinnert, and nephews Randall Newsome and Chris Newsome. Donations in Jim Rinnert's memory may be made to Season of Concern for the Biscotto-Miller Fund online at SeasonofConcern.org/donate or by check to: Season of Concern Chicago, 8 S. Michigan Ave, Ste 2700, Chicago IL 60603. With thanks to Brent Fisher and Albert Williams |