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‘Black Stories Matter’ live storytelling show to benefit Black Lives Matter DC

Black Stories Matter, a live online storytelling show benefiting Black Lives Matter DC, will be presented by the DMV’s Better Said Than Done on Zoom July 10, 2020. Black Stories Matter features eight...

How to join the ‘Hamilton’ revolution

Founding Father Alexander Hamilton (ca. 1757-1804) was a key figure in the American Revolution, so it’s only fitting that the stage musical Hamilton by Lin-Manuel Miranda (book, music, and lyrics)...

What ‘Into the Woods’ can teach us about surviving COVID-19

Broadway has been dark since March 12 due to the coronavirus pandemic, the longest shutdown in its history. With theaters shuttered from Broadway to the Beltway, musical theater fans have an...

Why a whisper network turned into a tornado at Flying V

On Monday evening, June 22, 2020, the Board of Flying V Theatre Company terminated Cofounder and Artistic Director Jason Schlafstein following a weekend of sexual misconduct and harassment allegations...

DMV-area organizations plan for a virtual summer camp experience

As the end dates for social-distancing recommendations keep being pushed further toward the end of the year, many DC, Maryland, and Virginia arts organizations are committing to an effort to connect...

Youth respond to COVID-19 in heartfelt ‘Inside Voices’ film from Arena Stage

For school-age children, their world has turned upside down because of COVID-19. Over the past three months, children and youth have lived from a distance in a virtual world, lived with a muffled...

Hot button issues for Black theater: A roundtable on revolution

Juneteenth 2020, Washington, DC—In response to the historic Black Lives Matter movement, DC Theater Arts has committed to offer our communications channel to help amplify the BIPOC voices (Black,...

Woolly Mammoth launches new Connectivity Core Partner Program

As the nation grapples with profound racial unrest—in addition to a global health crisis that is disproportionately affecting Black and Indigenous people—DC’s Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company is...

In ‘May 22, 2020’ from Arena Stage, a day in the life of the COVID DMV

“I read the news today, oh boy… / the news was rather sad…” That day was May 22, 2020. In a leap into film docudrama creation, Arena Stage’s Artistic Director Molly Smith chronicles a sad day in the...

Theatermakers of color call white theater to account for systemic racism

The cultural momentum powering protests that followed the May 25 murder of George Floyd has galvanized a national and local movement for transformational change in American theater led by Black,...

A challenge to theaters to reopen now—outdoors

When are the Small Box theater companies going to throw off the straightjacket of conventional space-bound theater and explore alternative venues? Black Lives Matter Plaza was created overnight with a...

Scenes of radical hospitality for #OpenYourLobby at STC and Woolly (photos)

Six DC theaters welcomed #BlackLivesMatter protesters the weekend of June 5 to 7, 2020 . Photographer Malcolm Lewis Barnes reports from two of them, Shakespeare Theatre Company and Woolly Mammoth...

The stirring street theater of Black Lives Matter in DC (photos)

The sheer creativity and inventiveness of the protesters was on full display at every turn as they each seemed to come prepared with energy and a message. As if re-experiencing What to Send Up When It...

NOVA playwright Soo-Jin Lee’s streaming ‘Peaches’ is bittersweet and affecting

With DMV theaters still shuttered because of COVID-19, there has been the opportunity to explore original streaming content written by local playwrights. One of those playwrights is Northern Virginia...

LA TI DO revises LA TI DOnline launch to support Black Lives Matter

LA TI DO Productions (LTD) has delayed its launch of LA TI DOnline to create space for the communities its connected to in support of focusing on Black Lives Matter protests resulting from the deaths...

How does ‘Homebound’ happen? A peek behind the screens

There has been oodles of well-deserved praise for Round House Theatre’s homegrown Homebound, an original ten-installment web series exploring life under stay-at-home orders. Penned by some of the DC...

A void in live protest theater is a silenced cry of pandemic proportions

Once again, anti-Black violence strikes at the heart and soul of America. We are shocked and saddened to watch an unarmed, handcuffed Black man struggle to breathe as he lies helpless on the ground....

Rehearsals in PPE and other big changes to expect when theaters reopen in DC

We will open again. The COVID-19 virus will neither darken nor silence us even with the many scary unknowns before us. We know reopening for DMV theater will happen. The date may be uncertain, but...

The vision and resurrection of Studio Acting Conservatory

When Joy Zinoman—the doyenne of DC theater and founder of Studio Acting Conservatory—describes the training center’s new home as a “sacred place,” she’s not exaggerating. “Theater is my religion,” she...

Studio Theatre welcomes ten new commissioned artists

Building on over 40 years of producing powerful contemporary theater, Studio Theatre is embarking on the largest round of commissioning in its history. They are awarding grants to ten...

Applications now open for $500 microgrants to emerging writers and composers

A new arts program—Emergent Seed—is offering $500 microgrants and the opportunity for emerging writers and composers in the DC Metro area to have their work broadcast in virtual events. Committed to...

Signature Theatre postpones ‘Mamma Mia!’ at The Anthem until 2021

Mamma Mia! at The Anthem DC will not run June 25 – July 5, 2020 as previously scheduled. Signature Theatre has worked with our sponsors Amazon and Max Productions and our partners at The Anthem and...

Young Artists of America at Strathmore announces virtual summer camp program

Young Artists of America at Strathmore (YAA) is thrilled to announce Virtual Summer Performing Arts Intensives, an online version of their award-winning summer musical theater program. While COVID-19...

DMV-area organizations continue to cancel and postpone events due to COVID-19 pandemic

After a month of cancelations, DMV area organizations continue to postpone or cancel shows and events, as well as make changes for their 2020-2021 season. The following list reflects those...

Major-media reviewers voice worries about returning to the theater

Twice a month, Terry Teachout of the Wall Street Journal; Elisabeth Vincentelli, contributor to The New York Times and The New Yorker; and Peter Marks of The Washington Post get together on “3 on the...

Five great films about theater (to help you survive staying home)

Karen Richards (Celeste Holm) the playwright’s wife: A part in a play. You’d do all that for a part in a play? Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter) conniving actress: I’d do much more for a part that good....

Faction of Fools Theatre Company announces new Co-Directors

At a time when theater companies around the country must push back production schedules, their missions are amplified to plan future productions that will uplift, transform, and heal. At Faction of...

Spooky Action shifts new play readings to YouTube

Due to the COVID-19 epidemic, Spooky Action Theater’s New Works in Action play-reading series has been shifted to a virtual meeting space on the company’s YouTube channel. “We are excited to explore...

IN Series to build a digital opera house without walls

If the COVID-19 pandemic has a lesson for the arts community, it’s that what’s small can still be mighty. Without a house to fill and lavish sets and costumes to maintain, Washington’s tiny itinerant...

Adventure Theatre honors API Heritage Month with streaming special events

Though the sea of online content is deep at the moment, that’s not stopping Adventure Theatre MTC. They are diving right in with a full lineup of API Heritage Month storytimes, interviews, and digital...

Gwydion Suilebhan: “Now is the time for artists to ask The Deep Why”

By Gwydion Suilebhan In 1960, a Turkish immigrant named Erol Onaran arrived in the United States with a whopping $32 in his pocket and a fair bit of skill as a television repair person. Erol was a man...

When shows go on again, audiences across America will be slow to show up, says new survey.

Shugoll Research, a national marketing research company in Bethesda, Maryland, is releasing a Phase III study of theatergoers and their intent to return to the theater when it reopens after the...

Theater artists to envision the future in Saturday chats online from Olney

In a time when connection is more important than ever, Olney Theatre Center is revamping its Streaming Saturdays, a live online discussion series featuring the perspectives of a wide range of theater...

Brave Spirits Theatre kicks off festival of playreadings from the early English stage

Brave Spirits Theatre announces a virtual summer staged reading festival celebrating the history plays of the English early modern stage. A supplement to BST’s two-year Shakespeare’s Histories...

National Theatre of London streams an epic ‘Antony and Cleopatra’

As we ease into an impromptu season of watching live theater captured on video, it’s helpful to remember that there are challenges of scale. This is especially true in the case of webcasts from the...

Pandemic Theatre launches ‘Much Ado About Nothing’ as 5-part web series

Amongst the chaos of COVID-19, another brand-new theater company has sprung up in the DC area. Pandemic Theatre, founded by local actor and theater maker Acacia Danielson, is turning to digital...

Lessons in creative coping during COVID-19: Bowie State University theater and dance faculty tell how it’s going

With university campuses closed because of COVID-19, how is student education continuing forward? This is a critical question, especially for higher education theater and dance departments—where...

Many theatergoers in no hurry to go back to Broadway, new survey finds

Shugoll Research, a national marketing research company in Bethesda, Maryland, is releasing a new study of theatergoers and their intent to return to the theater when it reopens after the coronavirus...

IN Series produces first ever fully digital opera performance season

As performing arts organizations worldwide struggle to schedule live performance seasons in the midst of a global pandemic, DC’s IN Series leads the charge onto the digital stage by programming an...

‘Hamilton’ and other shows postponed as Kennedy Center delays re-opening through August 9

The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts announced today the postponement of all scheduled ticketed performances through August 9, 2020, due to the ongoing effects of COVID–19. The Center’s...

Mosaic Theater Company promises provocative 2020–2021 season

In the face of global crisis and economic uncertainty, Mosaic Theater Company of DC draws inspiration for its new season from a nucleus of towering yet under-appreciated figures in history. These...

‘The Grapes of Wrath’ at The American Shakespeare Center strikes a haunting note

“It’s need that makes all the trouble” says (ex-) preacher Jim Casy in John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath. That, in a nutshell, is the ordeal of our times, as millions live without paychecks and...

Local playwrights write short scripts you can download for free

In the wake of COVID-19 theater closures, DC’s Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Baltimore Center Stage, Connecticut’s Long Wharf Theatre, The Public Theater of NYC, and The Repertory Theatre of St....

The Apple Family returns with ‘What Do We Need to Talk About?’ on Zoom

In 2010, award-winning playwright Richard Nelson began his series of plays in The Rhinebeck Panorama, named for the town in upstate New York where he lives. After ten years of installments on the...

The American Shakespeare Center’s streaming ‘Much Ado About Nothing’ is a much-needed romp

Yes, it’s a drag to have to stay at home instead of seeing our favorite performers live—but then again, after a little adjustment, it’s amazing to get to see our favorite performers at home. Our...

Round House Theatre premieres ‘Homebound’ web series

Round House Theatre is making streaming news with their project Homebound, a new web series bringing together DC-area playwrights, actors, and designers to explore life under stay-at-home orders in...

Quotidian Theatre Company to close, a casualty of COVID-19

Those of us in the arts are all getting used to a new normal. Unfortunately, a return to any kind of normal will not be possible for some organizations. And, sadly, it turns out that Quotidian Theatre...

DCMTA Spring 2020 Staff Favorites: Outstanding Community Theater Productions, Performances, and Design Elements

Normally we who cover theater for DC Theater Arts collect our favorites as the year draws to a close, but this has not been a normal year. In mid-March the 2020 season was interrupted by a pandemic...

When theaters reopen, will DMV audiences return? Survey says it’s iffy.

What follows is sobering news about the challenges ahead for the DMV theater community. We at DC Theater Arts share this information in a spirit of solidarity and with determination to do all we can...

Round House Theatre announces full 2020–2021 season

Round House Theatre Artistic Director Ryan Rilette and Managing Director Ed Zakreski recently announced the six shows that will constitute Round House Theatre’s 43rd season. All shows will be...