News

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘The Groom’s a Fag; The Bride’s a Cunt; The Best Man’s a Whore; and the Maiden of Honor (Just) Hung Herself in the Closet’ by On the Rocks at The Beard Cave at St. Mary’s Church

What do you get when you mix over-the-top parody with uncensored vulgarity with pure poetry? The Groom’s a Fag; The Bride’s a Cunt; The Best Man’s a Whore; and the Maiden of Honor (Just) Hung Herself...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘These Terrible Things’ by the University of the Arts and The Berserker Residents at the Caplan Studio Theater

It’s a zany self-referencing case of art imitating life in These Terrible Things, as the University of the Arts and The Berserker Residents team up for an absolutely hilarious parody of training...

Analysis: Charlottesville Theater Groups Respond to Last Month’s Deadly Rally

On August 11th and 12th, a group of neo-Nazis, fascists, and white supremacists thronged Charlottesville, Virginia. They were there to protest – peacefully, they’d said – the removal of a statue of...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Tilda Swinton Adopt Me Please’ by The Greenfield Collective at the Asian Arts Initiative

Both laugh-out-loud funny and intensely affecting, The Greenfield Collective makes its powerful mark on the Fringe with Tilda Swinton Adopt Me Please, an original work devised by Nicholas Scheppard...

News: The Round World Presents ‘Tales from the Round World: The Log of the Salty Pearl’

The Round World is excited to present Tales from the Round World: The Log of the Salty Pearl, the second in their series of live radio plays with variety acts interspersed to raise money for great...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Iphigenia at Aulis’ by the Philadelphia Artists’ Collective at the USS Olympia

“What gods?” asks the devastated Clytemnestra after the sacrifice of her first-born daughter Iphigenia, in The Philadelphia Artists’ Collective’s Fringe adaptation of Iphigenia at Aulis. The ancient...

News: Two Years After Launching Mosaic, Ari Roth Reflects

This piece, “Two Years After Launching Mosaic, Ari Roth Reflects” by Marilyn Millstone was originally published on HowlRound, a knowledge commons by and for the theatre community, on September 12,...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Leaps of Faith and Other Mistakes’ by Almanac at the Painted Bride Art Center

Did you ever want to sail away from it all and begin anew with a circle of like-minded friends? That’s what the figures in Almanac’s Leaps of Faith and Other Mistakes do, in a decision that tests...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Strange Tenants’ by Sam Tower + Ensemble at Power Plant Productions

Evincing the seminal inspiration of Fringe mainstays Pig Iron Theatre Company and New Paradise Laboratories, Strange Tenants is the latest original work developed in Sam Tower + Ensemble’s...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Labor of Love’ by The WaitStaff at L’Étage Cabaret

Philadelphia sketch-comedy icon, and longest-running annual act in the history of the Fringe, The WaitStaff marks its seventeenth year of participation with an all-new Labor of Love. Directed by the...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘. . . strand . . .’ by JUNK at Grays Ferry Crescent Trail Park

A transportive adventure awaits Fringe-goers in JUNK’s . . . strand . . ., as Brian Sanders and his stunning troupe contemplate the enigma of the time-space continuum in a dreamlike meditation on the...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘United’ by The Revivalists at the Betsy Ross House

Performed in the candlelit courtyard of the historic Betsy Ross House and opening in the 2017 Fringe on September 9 – the same date, in 1776, that the Second Continental Congress declared our Colonies...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Fishtown – A Hipster Noir’ by Tribe of Fools at the Louis Bluver Theatre at the Drake

A spot-on parody of the retro-style of film noir in a hilarious send-up of our ever-growing post-modern obsession with social media and technology, Fishtown – A Hipster Noir reaffirms Tribe of Fools’...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘As the Matzo Ball Turns – The Musical’ by Heart of a Lion Productions at the Independence Seaport Museum

A ten-year account of the failed pursuit of his Hollywood dreams, Gene Duffy’s As the Matzo Ball Turns – The Musical is an ambitious stage adaptation of the eponymous 2012 autobiographical chronicle...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Pericles’ by Die-Cast at The Rotunda

Brainchild of Director Brenna Geffers and Designer Thom Weaver, the newly-formed Die-Cast makes its public premiere in the 2017 Fringe Festival with an arresting re-envisioning of the rarely-produced...

Interview: Everyman Artistic Director Vincent Lancisi on Serendipity and ‘M. Butterfly’

There’s a story circulating about Everyman Theatre’s Artistic Director, Vincent Lancisi, and it’s one of the best What I Did on My Summer Vacation yarns around. It involves two continents, 16,000...

In the Moment: ‘Iola’s Letter: The Memphis Crusade of Ida B. Wells’ at Hill Center

So here we are in late 2017. And in the past several months, nooses have appeared in the Washington DC area, on the campus of American University, at the University of Maryland, inside the National...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Game Show Show’ by Found Theater Company at the MAAS Building

Seen through the lens of the popular phenomenon of the TV game show, Found Theater Company’s latest ensemble-devised Fringe offering, Game Show Show, considers the ethical dilemma of how far a person...

DCMetroTheaterArts Announces New Editor-in-Chief, Joel Markowitz Named Editor Emeritus

As Founding Editor Continues to Endure Debilitating Effects of ALS, Revitalized Staff Regroups to Carry Forward His Vision Metro DC (September 7, 2017)—DCMetroTheaterArts (DCMTA)—the website that...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Eugène Ionesco’s The Bald Soprano’ by The Idiopathic Ridiculopathy Consortium at the Bethany Mission Gallery

The banality of bourgeois life, the futile desperation to find meaning in mundane existence, the trivial chatter and vapid clichés used to fill the emptiness of everyday being, and the failure of...

Interview: Nicole Atkins on Performing at The Hamilton on September 12, 2017

“It was just so fun,” Nicole Atkins says about the recording process for Good Night Rhonda Lee, her fourth studio album. “We recorded it live, and everything was really in the present moment,...

Doing Double Duty in the Philadelphia Fringe: An Interview with Jenna Kuerzi, Eric Singel, and Hannah Van Sciver

Three of the most enthusiastic veterans of the Philadelphia Fringe Festival are each doing not one, but two shows this year. Jenna Kuerzi finishes out the final installment of On the Rocks’ “Dead...

Preview: Women Playwrights Set to Take Page-to-Stage by Storm

Want to see some really cool plays with women at the helm of the production? We’ve got great news for you! Women playwrights and women-led theater companies are ready to entertain you at the Kennedy...

Review: The American Pops Orchestra Presents ‘Season 3 Opening Celebration! With Marilyn Maye’ at Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater

Luke Frazier, American Pops Orchestra founder and Music Director, kicked off the Orchestra’s third season with a delightful concert featuring acclaimed jazz legend, Marilyn Maye. Maye was backed by a...

Here are the 2017 Barrymore Awards Nominations

The nominations for the Barrymore Awards for Excellence in Theatre for the 2016-17 season have been announced by Theatre Philadelphia. A total of 23 companies were recognized across 27 categories. 22...

Everyman Theatre and the Maryland Film Festival join forces for stage-inspired screening series at the Parkway

Six-part guest-hosted series merges audiences and art forms Baltimore, MD – Everyman Theatre and the Maryland Film Festival (MdFF) are pleased to announce “Everyman at the Parkway,” a season-long...

‘No Ransom To Be Paid’ at Pangea: An Update on ‘GRINDR: The Opera’ and More with Erik Ransom

Featured this summer in producer Ed Miller’s No Ransom To Be Paid four-part series at Pangea, the presented works of writer/composer/musician/actor Erik Ransom include songs from More Than All the...

Review: ‘A Never-Ending Line’ at The Players Theatre

Conceived by Composer and Director Jaime Lozano as a loving tribute to the women in his life and his matriarchal upbringing, A Never-Ending Line, produced by Maribel Escobosa, Martha Orendain, and...

Review: ‘Lili Marlene’ at St. Luke’s Theatre

Taking its name from the romantic wartime ballad famously recorded by Marlene Dietrich in 1945, and which, in its earlier German and English versions, had become uniquely popular with both Nazi and...

Benefit: ‘One Night in Bangkok’ Featuring Members of ‘The King and I’ to Benefit Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS on August 14

Join members of The King and I’s royal court as they step out of character for good fun and a good cause at One Night in Bangkok, a one-night only cabaret benefit for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS...

Review: ‘Gruff!’ at the McGinn/Cazale Theatre

Part of the first Summer Family Theater Festival at the McGinn/Cazale Theatre, Gruff!, a co-presentation by Vital Theatre Company and Doppelskope, is everything that great children’s theater should...

Review: ‘A Real Boy’ at 59E59 Theaters

In the world premiere of A Real Boy, presented by Ivy Theatre Company in association with Athena Theatre at 59E59, playwright Stephen Kaplan significantly reimagines Italian writer Carlo Collodi’s...

Review: ‘Georama’ at the New York Musical Festival

The rise and fall of the largely forgotten 19th-century American artist John Banvard is the subject of Georama, an irresistible bio-musical by West Hyler (book) and Matt Schazt (book, music, and...

Review: ‘Troilus and Cressida’ at the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival

Since 2011, the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival has presented one play a year in its “Extreme Shakespeare” series. The concept is to try to recreate in part the process believed to have been used in...

Review: ‘Wicked’ at the Academy of Music

From its origins in L. Frank Baum’s1900 novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz to its adaptation in MGM’s blockbuster 1939 film The Wizard of Oz to its annual TV broadcast on CBS beginning in 1956 (which...

Review: ‘Moon over Buffalo’ at People’s Light

Now in production at People’s Light, Ken Ludwig’s Moon over Buffalo, directed by Pete Pryor, contains all the expected elements of a farce: there’s mistaken identity; insult humor; impassioned...

Deb Miller’s Top Picks for the ‘2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival’

From antiquity to the present, tragedy and drama to absurdism and comedy, masterpieces by classic playwrights to experimental ensemble-devised works by local artists, the 2017 Philadelphia Fringe...

Interview: Joan Almedilla Discusses Playing Lady Thiang in ‘The King and I’ at The Kennedy Center

It’s difficult to imagine a more lush or beautiful production to take the stage at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts than Rodgers and Hammerstein’s The King and I. The revival, which...

Review: ‘Barefoot in the Park’ at The Candlelight Theatre

Six days do not a week make. These famous words of nonsense, uttered by the young wife Cory, will tell all serious theatergoers that they are in the domain of Neil Simon and his oft-performed...

Review: ‘New York – The Melting Pot’ at Soulpepper on 42nd Street

The first in Soulpepper Theatre Company’s three-part musical celebration of the history of diversity in New York – The Melting Pot pays tribute to Lower Manhattan, from Battery Park to Chelsea....

Review: ‘Night Tide’ at the New York Musical Festival

Ancient sea lore meets Sixties beach party in Night Tide, a new musical parody by Taylor Tash (book and lyrics) and Nathania Wibowo (music), based on Curtis Harrington’s 1961 B-movie thriller of the...

An Interview with Josh Hitchens and Ryan Walter: Going Dark in the New Jersey Fringe with ‘The Confession of Jeffrey Dahmer’

Between 1978 and 1991, Jeffrey Dahmer committed the shocking murders of seventeen men, involving necrophilia, dismemberment, cannibalism, and the preservation of the victims’ body parts. After years...

Review: ‘Alligator Pie’ at Soulpepper on 42nd Street

Adapted from the verses of beloved children’s book author and poet Dennis Lee – known to generations of fans as “Canada’s Father Goose” – Soulpepper Theatre Company’s ensemble-devised Alligator Pie,...

Review: ‘Cage’ at Soulpepper on 42nd Street

The avant-garde work and Zen convictions of 20th-century American composer John Cage are the inspiration for Soulpepper Theatre Company’s ensemble-devised piece Cage, performed in this month’s...

Review: ‘Matthew McConaughey Vs The Devil’ at the New York Musical Festival

Deserving recipient of an Academy Award for Best Actor, or modern-day Faust who sold his soul to capture Hollywood’s biggest honor? Emilie Landmann (book), Carrie Morgan (book and lyrics), and...

Review: ‘The Summer Club: 3rd Anniversary Special’ at Venice Island Performing Arts Center

Back at Manayunk’s Venice Island Performing Arts Center, The Summer Club celebrated its third anniversary on a very hot night with an even hotter performance. With yesterday’s total breakdown of the...

Review: ‘The New and Improved Stages of Grief’ at Act II Playhouse

Inevitably, we will each encounter some kind of experience with death as we grow, and although it may be one of our greatest shared experiences, grieving is still a personal process. A mixture of...

Review: ‘2017 Summer One-Act Bonanza’ at Old Academy Players

Ten-minute plays are a modern phenomenon. Some critics refer to them as “theatrical fast food” or “audience sound-bites” but this type of play demands a writer who can present exciting ideas in the...

Review: ‘Of Human Bondage’ at Soulpepper on 42nd Street

The first-ever stage adaptation of W. Somerset Maugham’s Of Human Bondage, written by Vern Thiessen and directed by Albert Schultz for Canada’s Soulpepper Theatre Company, is also the recipient of the...

DC Theatre Scene and DCMetroTheaterArts’ Joint Capital Fringe Coverage Begins Tonight

The two media companies combine writing strength to review 70 openings in 6 days The editors and publishers of DC’s two major theater websites—DC Theatre Scene and DCMetroTheaterArts—today announced...