Reviews

Review: ‘The Winter’s Tale’ at the American Shakespeare Center

For all his brilliance, Shakespeare still suffers from the occasional whining of critics about his later “problem” plays. Longer and more complex, with familiar plot lines splintered and grafted into...

Review: ‘A Christmas Carol’ at the American Shakespeare Center (Staunton, VA)

We all have our own holiday traditions – lighting candles one night after the next, caroling, choral concerts, dreidel-spinning, Christmas Revels, Christmas-day Chinese fare, etc.—and they all bring...

Review: ‘The Elves and the Shoemaker’ at Keegan Theatre

Capitalism. Exploitation. Greed. It’s the holiday season, folks, and your kids shouldn’t lose out on the fun. At Keegan Theatre’s The Elves and the Shoemaker, they won’t. Written by Kristin Walter and...

‘Talley’s Folly’ Dances Through the Holiday Season at Theater J

Talley’s Folly – now in its final week at GALA Hispanic Theatre on 14th Street – is a waltz. Meaning, it’s not a salsa. And it’s not a hustle, a tango or even a hot pasodoble. On the other hand, it’s...

Review: ‘The Play That Goes Wrong’ at the Kennedy Center

Even before the curtain officially goes up on The Play That Goes Wrong, you can tell you are in for a laugh riot. The show’s “Director” Chris Bean (played by Evan Alexander Smith), “Stage Manager”...

Magic Time!: ‘Washington Magic’ at the Arts Club of Washington

When I was a kid, magic tricks and puppet shows were forerunners to my love of theater. They were like my gateway drug. I got hooked on the wonder and live storytelling. And to this day I associate...

Review: ‘An Irish Carol’ at Keegan Theatre

With a heart as cold as the blustery winds blowing people in and out the door, An Irish Carol by Matthew J. Keenan finds David, a pub’s miserly owner, confronted by guests of his past and glimpses of...

‘Miss Saigon’: Time To Say Goodbye?

A blunt assessment: It’s time to move on. It is time to retire Miss Saigon as the seductive, out-of-touch, museum piece that it is. Miss Saigon has little to say about the sorrows of the Vietnam War....

Magic Time!: ‘Kings’ at Studio Theatre

“Laws are like sausages,” goes the adage. “It’s better not to see them being made.” As it happens, I have a good mental picture of how sausages are made, because for three summers during college I...

Review: ‘Man of La Mancha’ at Workhouse Arts Center

Man of La Mancha has long been an icon of mid-20th century American musical theater with its share of 1966 Tony Awards. This show about a man marching forward for “a heavenly cause” is a staple of...

Review: ‘Miss Saigon’ at The Kennedy Center

Miss Saigon is all grown up. Sort of. It’s been almost 30 years since Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schonberg’s blockbuster opened in London’s West End and took the world by storm. But times have...

Review: ‘A Christmas Messe’ at Folger Shakespeare Library

This time of year, it can be challenging to keep your spirits merry and bright through the commercialized din of holiday exhortations. Well, I may have found an antidote to the seasonal fog....

Review: ‘Oh, God’ at Mosaic Theater Company

Theater and theology have been boon companions for eons. Ever since religion was invented, humans have wanted divinities with drama. Way back in polytheistic antiquity, playgoers imagined gods as...

Review: ‘Kings’ at Studio Theatre

Kings at Studio Theatre is both entertaining and thought-provoking in every sense. Beautifully acted and directed, it reminds us that politicians, even though it may be hard to believe at times, are...

Review: ‘The Rocky Horror Show’ by Iron Crow Theatre

When the pre-show features an audience participation orgasm contest, can things possibly get any wilder? Yes indeed, as Iron Crow Theatre’s Rocky Horror Show readily proves. Rocky has always been an...

Review: ‘Driving Miss Daisy’ at Anacostia Playhouse

Driving Miss Daisy, at Anacostia Playhouse, tackles many subjects: growing older, race relations, and all sorts of personal drama encountered by its Southern protagonists over a 25-year period,...

Review: ‘Striking 12’ by Free Range Humans at BlackRock Center for the Arts

Striking 12 is a striking exception to the mandatory Christmas sappiness occupying most entertainment venues this time of year. It’s set at holiday time, but the holiday in question is New Year’s Eve,...

Review: ‘Talley’s Folly’ at Theater J

As Talley’s Folly opens, 40-something-year-old, self-described “hairy Jewish accountant” Matt Friedman (John Taylor Phillips) steps onto the stage and informs the audience that he has 97 minutes to...

Review: Olney Ballet Theatre’s ‘The Nutcracker’

There are certain things that start popping up everywhere to mark the Holiday season. Carols on the radio. Decorations on houses and main streets. (Objecting to the fact that both of these are...

Review: ‘My Father’s Dragon’ at Synetic Theater

Synetic Theater produces another visually captivating and emotion-filled journey in their newest show, My Father’s Dragon. The story, adapted by Ryan Sellers, is based on the children’s book of the...

Review: The Gay Men’s Chorus Holiday Show

The Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington, DC presented their annual Holiday Show on a cold winter’s night and the warmth exuded by this very polished and respected chorus obliterated any bitter winds. Since...

Review: ‘The Panties, The Partner and The Profit’ at Shakespeare Theatre Company

Just in time for an escape from too many holiday-spiked eggnog toasts, Shakespeare Theatre Company (STC) provides an appealing, sugar-coated farce to indulge audiences. It will especially ring with...

Review: ‘A Rockabilly Christmas’ at Riverside Center for the Performing Arts

This holiday season, Riverside Center for the Performing Arts presents A Rockabilly Christmas, co-created by Todd Meredith, Patrick A’Hearn and Jeremy Renner. For this production, Riverside returns...

Review: ‘Madeline’s Christmas’ at Creative Cauldron

This holiday season, Creative Cauldron reprises Madeline’s Christmas, with book and lyrics by Jennifer Kirkeby and music by Shirley Mier, based on the beloved children’s book by Ludwig Bemelmans....

Review: ‘The Importance Of Being Earnest’ at Everyman Theatre

The Importance Of Being Earnest, often touted as a perfect comedy, plays at Everyman Theatre in downtown Baltimore through the end of the month. Oscar Wilde’s final play, as performed by Everyman’s...

Review: ‘The Nutcracker’ at Ballet Theatre of Maryland

Ballet Theatre of Maryland’s production of The Nutcracker is a colorful sensation, with beautiful costumes and lovely dancing mixed with inventive lighting and a charming set. Choreographed by...

Review: ‘The Christmas Revels: An Elizabethan Celebration of the Winter Solstice’ at Washington Revels

Washington Revels rings in the holiday season with their 36th annual production of The Christmas Revels. For those unfamiliar with the revels format, the show is an annual tradition which revolves...

Review: The Second City’s ‘Love, Factually’ at the Kennedy Center

The Second City lights up the Kennedy Center’s holiday season again this year with their new production, Love, Factually. Featuring a top-rate cast directed by Frank Caeti, The Second City delivers a...

Report: ‘2018 DC Queer Theatre Festival’ at The DC Arts Center

Now in its sixth year, The DC Center’s DC Queer Theatre Festival delivers on its promise to unleash and celebrate underrepresented voices and diversity. After evaluating over thirty submissions, seven...

Review: ‘She The People’ at the Second City at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company

It’s common knowledge that the female cast members of Saturday Night Live like Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones practically run the high-profile comedy sketch show. The myth that women cannot be funny...

Review: ‘A Wonder in my Soul’ at Baltimore Center Stage

“We fight like cats, but we love like dogs.” Marcus Gardley, the author of A Wonder in my Soul has just the right way of putting things. Baltimore Center Stage continues its standard of excellence...

Review: ‘The Chronicles of Narnia’ by the Arts Collective at Howard Community College

If Narnia was one of your beloved childhood worlds, you have the opportunity to share it with your nearest and dearest without anyone having to actually (perish the thought!) read–but only for a...

Review: ‘The Nutcracker’ by Ballet West at The Kennedy Center

Ballet West’s Nutcracker, conducted by Jared Oaks, is one of the most unique productions to hit the stage this season at the Kennedy Center. Steeped in lush colors, with a gorgeous set design and...

Review: ‘Crystal’ by Cirque du Soleil at Capital One Arena

Cirque du Soleil’s Crystal is staged on a slick sheet of ice where acrobats and skaters combine to create an amazing entertainment. A spectacular array of chills and charms to thrill and warm the...

Review: ‘Anastasia’ at The Hippodrome Theatre

There’s nothing wrong with Anastasia: The New Broadway Musical that a little modern relevance wouldn’t cure. It certainly looks sensational inside the grand proscenium framing of Baltimore’s historic...

Review: ‘Gem of the Ocean’ at Round House Theatre

There are only ever seven characters onstage in this majestic production—three of them former slaves—but it is as if multitudes of Africans lost crossing the ocean or sold in chains are evoked and...

Review: ‘Christmas at the Old Bull & Bush’ at MetroStage

Back by popular demand, MetroStage has Christmas at the Old Bull & Bush again for its 2018 holiday season. Written and directed by Catherine Flye, Christmas is reflective of British variety music hall...

Review: ‘A Christmas Carol: A Ghost Story of Christmas’ at Olney Theatre Center

The entryway to the Muritz-Gudelsky Theatre Lab at the Olney Theatre Center is lined with holiday lights and garnish. The cozy lobby is adorned with electric candles and sprigs of holly, creating a...

Magic Time!: ‘How to Keep an Alien’ by Solas Nua

I can’t recall seeing another play by someone who came to playwrighting from standup, but I’ll not soon forget how I laughed my feckin head off at Sonya Kelly’s How to Keep an Alien. Kelly, an Irish...

Review: ‘How to Keep an Alien’ at Solas Nua

Love is unique. It is an intense bond of emotion, desire, and care between two people, deeply special to one another, that for them cannot be duplicated anywhere on Earth. Bureaucracy must routinize...

Review: ‘Fancy Nancy: Splendiferous Christmas’ at Adventure Theatre

If you are looking for some holiday merriment that is fun for all ages, dance and sing your way over to Adventure Theatre’s Fancy Nancy: Splendiferous Christmas. Fancy Nancy, with book by Cara Lustik...

In the Moment: ‘Indecent’ at Arena Stage

“Why must every Jew on stage be a paragon?” A key question asked without bombast by one of the fictional characters created by playwright Paula Vogel for Indecent, her daring stage play composed of...

Review: ‘Les Misérables: School Edition’ at Ovations Theatre

At a time when we are marching for our rights, a show like Les Misérables feels only too appropriate. If you don’t hear the people sing, then you have cotton in your ears. The outstanding senior...

Review: Paula Vogel’s ‘A Civil War Christmas: An American Musical Celebration’ at 1st Stage

A Civil War Christmas at 1st Stage is a strong addition to plays that connect with the holiday season. Playwright Paula Vogel embraces and examines provocative themes in this piece, looking at all of...

Review: Bob Bartlett’s ‘The Accident Bear’ at The Avenue Laundromat

The Accident Bear is an unusual play, staged in an even more unusual location. Written by Bob Bartlett and directed by Jay Brock, it is set in a laundromat and is performed at The Avenue Laundromat in...

Review: ‘Charley’s Aunt’ at Fells Point Corner Theatre

At 126 years old and still going strong, Charley’s Aunt by Brandon Thomas has lost none of its power to tickle an audience’s funny bone. Fells Point Corner Theatre’s production keeps the energy and...

Review: ‘The Crater Sisters’ Christmas Special’ at Best Medicine Rep

You can skip your one-hundredth viewing of A Christmas Carol or The Nutcracker this holiday season and, instead, laugh the evening away at the delightfully original musical comedy, The Crater Sisters’...

Review: ‘Woman of No Importance’ at Scena Theatre

The first thing you notice about Scena Theatre’s Woman of No Importance is Alisa Mandel’s lush costume design. Like an unnamed character, her costumes define the characters nearly as much as the...

Review: ‘Watergate…with Puppets’ by AnyStage Theater

Fans of zany humor might remember when AnyStage Theater popped up in the Capital Fringe Festival with its ridiculous (and mostly fact-free) takes on Margaret Thatcher and Amelia Earhart. The...

Review: ‘The Little Mermaid’ at Toby’s Dinner Theatre

The Little Mermaid is bringing big waves of happy little faces to Toby’s Dinner Theatre. Whether they come adorned in magical gowns with sparkling tiaras or sneakers that light up with every step,...