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Review: ‘Tootsie’ at the Marquis Theatre

When Tootsie the movie was released in 1982, it gave audiences a lighthearted look at rampant sexism, mistaken gender identity, and sexual harassment through the lens of the TV industry, as the...

Review: Broadway Center Stage: ‘The Who’s Tommy’ at Kennedy Center

Fifty years ago Rolling Stone reported completion of a new album by Pete Townshend and called it “probably the most important milestone in pop since Beatlemania. For the first time, a rock group has...

Nu Sass To Perform ‘Marx in Soho’ at Edinburgh Fringe Festival

DC-based theater company Nu Sass Productions is taking Marx in Soho to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival this summer. Marx in Soho, by American Historian Howard Zinn, will feature Mary Myers as Karl Marx...

Nominations Announced for the 2019 Drama Desk Awards

Nominations for the 64th annual Drama Desk Awards were announced this afternoon for the 2018-19 season, honoring the outstanding achievements of professional theater artists on Broadway, Off-Broadway,...

‘Love’s Labor’s Lost’ Director Vivienne Benesch Finds Inspiration in Folger Reading Room

Actor, director, and administrator Vivienne Benesch has many credits to her name. She is the Producing Artistic Director of the PlayMakers Repertory Company in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. For twelve...

Review: ‘Come From Away’ at Baltimore’s Hippodrome Theatre

Ideally, Come From Away should be seen in the round, with the audience gathered so close by that it can share the claustrophobia, fear and love of all those grounded passengers. It’s a pity to be kept...

Woolly Mammoth Announces Its 2019-2020 Season

Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company announces its 2019-2020 season, which features an energizing array of plays by new voices and Woolly veterans. The premiere season curated by Artistic Director María...

Review: ‘Hadestown’ at the Walter Kerr Theatre

One of the most haunting love stories of all time is the ancient Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, recounted in Virgil’s Georgics, Ovid’s Metamorphoses, and other literary classics. Devastated by...

Magic Time!: Disrupting the White Comfort Zone: A Q&A about ‘P.Y.G.’ at Studio Theatre

I have an ongoing interest in how theaters in DC with predominantly white audiences raise and represent the issue of race. And one of the things I’ve been noticing is how the white comfort zone...

Review: ‘Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus’ at the Booth Theatre

What’s so funny about mounds of bloody, dismembered, and spurting bodies, flatulence and excrement, necrophilia, and penises – lots and lots of penises? That depends on your sense of humor. Taylor...

Behind the Scenes at Shakespeare Theatre Company’s Props Warehouse

Staging an epic that involves a bloody chain of events in “a deluge of violence,” as the Shakespeare Theatre Company describes The Oresteia, requires not just the skills and talents of the actors on...

Magic Time: ‘Les Deux Noirs: Notes on Notes of a Native Son’ at Mosaic Theater Company

The splashy opening is spectacularly preconception-smashing. We know we’re about to see a play premised on a 1953 meeting in a Paris café between the literary lion Richard Wright and James Baldwin,...

When BSO’s OrchKids Show Up, Good Things Happen

In the early 1990s, I lived in New Orleans at the corner of Philip and Constance streets. At the time, it was the transition zone between the toney Garden District and the St. Thomas projects. More...

Review: ‘A Comedy of Tenors’ at Olney Theatre Center

Things are getting silly at the Olney Theatre Center these days. Very, very, silly. Very skillfully silly, in the production of Ken Ludwig’s A Comedy of Tenors. A follow-on to Ludwig’s highly popular...

Magic Time!: Inside the DC Jail with Liza Jessie Peterson and ‘The Peculiar Patriot’

Actor and Playwright Liza Jessie Peterson is an extraordinary artist/activist. Tucked inside her uproarious one-woman show, The Peculiar Patriot—which she performs through April 20, 2019, at Woolly...

Interview: JaBen Early in Arena Stage’s ‘Junk’

JaBen Early is a Washingtonian through and through. His father worked at the Smithsonian, and his mother was a teacher in DC. He went to Morehouse College and Sarah Lawrence University, and studied...

Review: ‘Junk’ at Arena Stage

“When did money become the thing—the only thing?” asks an ambitious young financial journalist in her opening monologue. She then answers her own question: “The mid-eighties. 1985 to be exact…. It was...

Signature Theatre Announces 2019-2020 Season

Signature Theatre Announces 30th Anniversary Season, including new and inventive stagings of: ASSASSINS A CHORUS LINE HAIR NIJINSKY’S LAST DANCE The DC Premiere of: CARYL CHURCHILL’S PLAY ESCAPED...

Review: ‘Grand Hotel’ at Signature Theatre

Time may be running out for the denizens of Berlin’s swanky Weimar era Grand Hotel who wonder if life has passed them by. But Signature Theatre’s roaring, non-stop rendering of the musical Grand Hotel...

‘Two Wings’ Celebrates the Music of Black America in Migration

“Pick a chord and I’ll be there,” Alicia Hall Moran told husband Jason Moran from the stage of a packed performance hall at Georgetown University. Moran, accompanying on piano, nodded in agreement....

Review: ‘Pinter Rep’ by Scena Theatre

When Pinter is performed with precision, with exacting attention to the text—as is the case with Scena Theatre’s razor-sharp Pinter Rep—the effect can be both unnerving and exhilarating. The tension...

Hit the Bars (of Music) For Lunch: Free Midday Concerts in the DC Area

Food trucks are a fun and a convenient way to sample something tasty and new, but don’t forget to check out the bars – of music that is. Several DC area venues offer bite-sized classical music...

Review: ‘P.Y.G. or The Mis-Edumacation of Dorian Belle’ at Studio Theatre

Don’t be put off by the deliberately opaque, long title of the current world premiere at Studio Theatre’s experimental space. P.Y.G. or The Mis-Edumacation of Dorian Belle is a very slick,...

Review: ‘The Peculiar Patriot’ at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company

A klaxon sounds. A video montage of “Betsy” LaQuanda Ross (actor and playwright Liza Jessie Peterson) passing through the visitor entrance at a correctional facility plays in black and white on the...

Review: ‘King Lear’ at the Cort Theatre

“’Tis the times’ plague when madmen lead the blind” (King Lear, Act IV, Scene 1) Based on the legendary Leir – ancient Celtic King of the Britons, whose story was recounted in Geoffrey of Monmouth’s...

Review: ‘The Book of Mormon’ at the Hippodrome Theatre

Ticket holders for The Book of Mormon national tour had better be prepared to exercise a muscle that doesn’t get much of a workout these days — the one that controls the “personally offended” gag...

Magic Time!: ‘Native Son’ at Mosaic Theater Company

When one has an overwhelming experience in the theater—as I did watching Native Son at Mosaic—it can take some time to process. This is especially so if the work is unlike anything one thought...

Washington Bach Consort’s Noontime Cantata Series: A DC Tradition in the Making

For thirty years, the Washington Bach Consort has offered its Noontime Cantata Series to Washingtonians seeking a free musical escape in the middle of the workday, something District officials have...

Director and Playwright Psalmayene 24 Discusses ‘Native Son’ and ‘Les Deux Noirs’

DC Theater Arts caught up with Director and Playwright Psalmayene 24 to discuss Native Son and Les Deux Noirs: Notes on Notes of a Native Son, which play in rep at the Mosaic Theater this month....

Chilling with Will Roland

From Dear Evan Hansen to Be More Chill, Will Roland has played a major role in two of the biggest hits on Broadway, both focused on teenage characters and relevant themes that appeal to a new...

Review: ‘Native Son’ at Mosaic Theater

We usually think of a rat as a detestable lowlife animal that we dread. It slinks in dark corners of the floor, hiding itself from being seen. It nervously darts and runs when spotted and can fit...

Review: ‘columbinus’ at 1st Stage

There’s a lot that’s shocking and disturbing in this show, as well there should be—it’s based on the April 20, 1999, shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. That massacre—during...

Cynthia Erivo Brings ‘Legendary Women’s Voices’ to the Kennedy Center

Cynthia Erivo may as well call the Kennedy Center home. Having previously performed with the National Symphony Orchestra, the intimacy between Erivo and the musicians is strong. For her upcoming...

Review: ‘A Bronx Tale’ at the National Theatre

Chazz Palminteri is one cool dude. Imagine having your own life story play to sold-out houses on and off Broadway, and be made into a classic film directed by none other than Robert De Niro. And De...

Annapolis Shakespeare Company Artistic Director Sally Boyett Discusses ‘Pride and Prejudice’ and ASC’s Current Season

Sally Boyett is the Artistic Director of Annapolis Shakespeare Company, which is making a name for itself with its clever productions of Shakespeare and the classics. She has directed many ASC shows,...

Review: ‘Resolving Hedda’ by Washington Stage Guild

What if your favorite dramatic heroine could – just for once – alter her tragic fate? That’s the question posed by playwright Jon Klein in the Washington Stage Guild’s production of Resolving Hedda....

15 Questions in 15 Minutes with Tiffany Mann from ‘Be More Chill’

Fifteen minutes of fame don’t even come close to the phenomenal success and widespread renown of Be More Chill and its cast, from the show’s origins in New Jersey in 2015, through its wildfire...

Review: ‘La Paloma at the Wall’ by The In Series

The In Series at GALA Theatre has succeeded in brilliantly breathing life into a treasured zarzuela – a blend of song and dance – which was written in 1894 and originally titled La Verbena de la...

Review: ‘Spills’ by Who What Where Theater Collective

We are seated on folding chairs in the living room of an actual house where two women and a man in their mid-twenties have agreed to meet up for a three-way. There’s a modest playing area for them and...

Adventure Theatre MTC Announces Departure of Artistic Director Michael J. Bobbitt

Adventure Theatre MTC (ATMTC) today announced that Michael J. Bobbitt, who has served as the organization’s artistic director since 2007, will be stepping down on July 1, 2019. Bobbitt, an...

“The Puppets Help Tell the Story”: World Puppetry Day Interview with ‘Vanity Fair’ Creative Team

In honor of World Puppetry Day celebrated on March 21st, it was time to learn more about the puppetry used in the Shakespeare Theatre Company production of Kate Hamill’s adaptation of Vanity Fair, now...

Review: ‘Ain’t Too Proud’ at the Imperial Theatre

One of the all-time greatest vocal groups from the golden age of Motown in the 1960s, The Temptations topped the charts with such iconic R&B and crossover hits as “The Way You Do The Things You Do,”...

Review: ‘Topdog/Underdog’ by Avant Bard

“Watch me close, watch me now!” As I watched Avant Bard’s production of Topdog/Underdog, I knew that it is a production for the ages. Under the visceral, athletic direction of DeMone Seraphin,...

Review: ‘Kiss Me, Kate’ at Studio 54

Winner of the first Tony Award for Best Musical when it made its debut in 1948, Kiss Me, Kate has a long history as one of the great Broadway classics by the legendary Cole Porter, who wrote the music...

Review: ‘Into the Woods’ at Ford’s Theatre

I have loved Sondheim’s Into the Woods since seeing its original Broadway production. Three decades on, Ford’s Theatre’s current version carries the tradition forward proudly. For anyone unfamiliar...

DC Playwright Collective The Welders Announce Third Generation Playwrights

A new generation of playwrights is taking over The Welders – Washington DC’s only playwrights’ collective devoted exclusively to developing and producing new work. Starting in January 2020, the Welder...

Review: ‘Fallen Angels’ at NextStop Theatre Company

If there could be a single word to describe NextStop Theatre Company’s production of Noel Coward’s 1925 comedy, Fallen Angels, it would be symmetry. Emily Lotz’s delightfully realized period set,...

Review: ‘Dinner with Friends’ at Everyman Theatre

Donald Margulies’ Pulitzer Prize-winning Dinner with Friends, which is celebrating its 20th anniversary this season, opened to an enthusiastic full house at Everyman on Friday. The play gives Director...

Magic Time!: ‘Queen of Basel’ at Studio Theatre

Queen of Basel by Hilary Bettis, now on the boards at Studio, is scathingly brilliant. One walks out gobsmacked. (I completely concur with my colleague Bob Ashby’s astute review.) But watching Queen...

2019 WATCH Award Winners and Ceremony Recap

The 19th Annual WATCH Awards recipients were announced tonight at a ceremony at The Birchmere in Alexandria Virginia. The ceremony was notable for two touching moments. Charles Hall, father of Leta...