Reviews

Review: ‘In Search of My Father…Walkin’ Talkin’ Bill Hawkins’ at Atlas Performing Arts Center

In Search of My Father…Walkin’ Talkin’ Bill Hawkins is an autobiographical exploration of identity and manhood packaged in a 90-minute one-man show written and performed by W. Allen Taylor. The play...

Review: ‘Handbagged’ by Round House Theatre (Women’s Voices Theater Festival)

Two powerful, verbally skilled women come together weekly for tea and talk for over a decade. They are locked in a power struggle about politics and cultural norms that affect a nation and the world....

Review: ‘[PORTO]’ at WP Theater

Now in its impressive Off-Broadway premiere at WP Theater in association with New Georges, following a critically-acclaimed run in the 2017 Exponential Festival at The Bushwick Starr (co-presenter of...

Local Music: Pearl Street Warehouse February Preview Playlist

At Pearl Street Warehouse, rock, country, folk, soul, bluegrass, rhythm and blues acts from around the country take the stage nightly, offering every seat in the house a front-row music experience....

Review: ‘Digging Up Dessa’ at The Kennedy Center (Women’s Voices Theater Festival)

Despite its off-putting (and overly-clever) title, Digging Up Dessa is a lively and often moving tale of two 12-year-olds who are lost in the middle of a strange new world and trying to find...

Review: ‘La Foto: A Selfie Affair’ at GALA Hispanic Theatre

“La Foto: A Selfie Affair is a simple story, both feminist and humorous, about how the intimacies of our daily lives can be exposed and exploited on social media.” ~ Gustavo Ott, playwright La Foto: A...

Review: ‘Skeleton Crew’ at Baltimore Center Stage (Women’s Voices Theater Festival)

As part of the Women’s Voices Theater Festival, to highlight the diversity and depth of new plays being written by women, Baltimore Center Stage showcases the fourth play of its 2017-18 season with...

The Cake is a Lie: ‘It’s the Rest of the World That Looks So Small’ at Flying V Theatre

I present to you this review of Flying V Theatre’s It’s the Rest of the World that Looks So Small: A Theatrical Revue of Jonathan Coulton, directed and conceived by Jason Schlafstein and Vaughn...

Review: ‘Long Day’s Journey Into Night’ at Everyman Theatre

Long Day’s Journey Into Night chills to the bone. The wind was howling as the cold air clipper passed through downtown Baltimore last Friday evening. Inside Everyman Theatre, an even more ferocious...

Review: ‘Character Building’ at American Ensemble Theater

There is something heart-stirring and inspiring about this new one-man musical. In between excerpts from glorious hymns and spirituals, the great African American educator and orator Booker T....

Review: ‘The Underpants’ at Rockville Little Theatre

Review by Bob Ashby The Underpants, an intermittently amusing adaptation by Steve Martin of a 1911 script by German playwright Carl Sternheim, concluded its run at Rockville Little Theater on February...

Review: ‘Image China: Dragon Boat Racing’ a Dynamic and Inspiring Offering at the Kennedy Center

One of the most amazing things in this eye-popping production happened after the show ended. The audience at The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts stood and applauded for more than ten...

Review: American Ballet Theatre’s ‘Whipped Cream’ at the Kennedy Center

Take a step away from the mundane. Shrug off your office separates, buff hose, and business professional thoughts, and riggle into a world more like a pop-up children’s book than the screaming...

Review: ‘Really’ at Theatre Exile

If you’re in the mood for a straightforward narrative with a clear-cut beginning, middle, and ending, then Theatre Exile’s Philadelphia premiere of Really, by Brooklyn-based playwright Jackie Sibblies...

Review: ‘Hairspray’ an Adventure Theatre ATMTC Academy Student Production

Adventure Theatre and ATMTC Academy presented their student production of Hairspray over the weekend. Young artists, ranging from grades four through twelve, hit the stage with all the energy and...

Fifteen Top Theater Picks for Valentine’s Day in NYC

If you’re in New York City for Valentine’s Day and planning to celebrate your love of the stage, Editor-in-Chief and Publisher Nicole Hertvik and Senior Reviewer Deb Miller have some suggestions for a...

Review: ‘Blithe Spirit’ at Annapolis Shakespeare Company

By Betsy Lizotte The Annapolis Shakespeare Company’s production of Noel Coward’s world-class comedy Blithe Spirit was an old-fashioned roller coaster of fun: an essentially delightful thrill-ride of...

Review: ‘American Ballet Theatre: Ratmansky, Robbins, Millepied and Wheeldon’ at the Kennedy Center

As parts of the nation settled in to hear 45 read the script of the State of the Union address, and other parts assiduously ignored the same, balletomanes and ballet goers in the Washington area...

In the Moment Part 2: Interviews with Playwrights Dominique Cieri, Wendy Graf and Hope Villanueva (Women’s Voices Theater Festival)

This is the second part of a two-part series of interviews with Women’s Voices Theatre Festival playwrights. In this series, I asked the same questions to a number of Women’s Voices Theatre Festival...

Review: ‘Waitress’ at the Hippodrome

You will want to leave a more-than-generous tip for the national tour of Waitress, especially if you appreciate top-notch service. It is currently bringing all the spicy baked sweetness of the...

Review: ‘The Very Last Days of the First Colored Circus’ at Restoration Stage

Inspired by the lives of his great-great-grandparents Ollie Thomas and Ruby Dyson, playwright Steven A. Butler Jr. brings their legacies to life in The Very Last Days of the First Colored Circus. Set...

Review: ‘The Dog Must Die’ at The Highwood Theatre

What is a life worth? What is the Earth worth? And what are we doing – what can we do, what should we do – to sustain and preserve them? These provocative questions, and other questions that are as...

Review: ‘Time Stands Still’ at Bristol Riverside Theatre

Time Stands Still, Donald Margulies’ fascinating drama at Bristol Riverside Theatre, seems at first as if it’s going to be a deep meditation on war and politics. But Margulies’ characters, as it turns...

Review: ‘The Humans’ at the Walnut Street Theatre

The Blakes are not your ordinary dysfunctional family. As they gather for Thanksgiving dinner in an unfamiliar locale, everything seem fine, if a little off-kilter; they engage in their favorite...

Review: ‘Almost, Maine’ at Greenbelt Arts Center

Almost, Maine, by John Cariani explores the upside and downside of love as experienced by the residents of its mythical, titular town. Playing as almost a comedic version of Our Town, the...

Review: ‘Sovereignty’ at Arena Stage

Sovereignty, the long-heralded new play by Mary Kathryn Nagle – a member of the Cherokee Nation and one of barely a dozen Native American playwrights writing today – has arrived. Inspired by a Supreme...

Review: ‘Cloud 9’ at Iron Crow Theatre

Do you enjoy the works of playwrights like Oscar Wilde and Nöel Coward, but wish their plays had a little more adultery? Then Cloud 9 by Caryl Churchill is the play for you. Never having seen the...

Review: Patriots and Scoundrels: Dominion Stage Presents a Biting ‘Assassins’

Written by Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman and directed by Melissa Jo York-Tilley, this production of the musical Assassins comes to Dominion Stage at one of the most politically tumultuous times in...

Review: ‘Company’ presented by Fredericktowne Players

Company, with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by George Furth, is now playing at the JBK Theater at the Frederick Community College presented by the Fredericktowne Players. It was...

Review: ‘4,380 Nights’ at Signature Theatre (Women’s Voices Theater Festival)

4,380 Nights is a raw, emotionally charged political theater production that makes the movie Zero Dark Thirty look timid. That is my trigger warning about a new play by Annalisa Dias that explores...

Review: ‘Rabbit Summer’ at Ally Theater Company

By Guest Author Cecilia Mencia Institutional racism, cultural trauma, gun right, police brutality: Playwright Tracy Conyer Lee tackles many social issues in her play Rabbit Summer. Directed by...

Review: ‘Young Frankenstein’ at Toby’s Dinner Theatre

It did not turn out well for Dr. Frankenstein or his monster, but receiving an abnormal brain was a blessing for Mel Brooks. After eight decades in show business, he is still using that gift to get...

Review: ‘Anne of Green Gables’ at Little Theatre of Alexandria

In the first decade of the 20th century, on a farm in the tiny village of Avonlea, in Canada’s smallest province, Prince Edward Island, a brother and sister realize they need help to sustain their...

Review: ‘Jefferson’s Garden’ at Ford’s Theatre

The Ford’s Theatre production of Jefferson’s Garden (by Timberlake Wertenbaker), which had its American premiere on January 24, tries to balance the oft-tread narrative of Thomas Jefferson’s role in...

An Interview with John Guare: Previewing the ‘Lydie Breeze Trilogy’ at Philadelphia’s EgoPo Classic Theater

With an illustrious career spanning the past five decades, John Guare has been the recipient of Tony, Obie, and Olivier Awards, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and an Oscar nominee, among...

Review: ‘Hamlet’ at Shakespeare Theatre Company

The Shakespeare Theatre Company’s production of Hamlet, directed by Michael Kahn, is a rich, multi-layered interpretation of a uniquely great play. Hamlet is central to the Western literary tradition....

Review: ‘Unnecessary Farce’ at The Keegan Theatre

With one two-act-long scene, eight loudly slamming doors, and countless head-over-heels tumbles, Unnecessary Farce by Paul Slade Smith makes its hilarious D.C. premiere at the Keegan Theatre. Directed...

Review: ‘This Is All Just Temporary’ at Convergence Theatre (Women’s Voices Theater Festival)

Convergence Theatre, as a part of the Women’s Voices Theater Festival, has produced a new play by Olivia Haller called This Is All Just Temporary. The original work focuses on college graduate Lauren,...

Review: ‘Hindle Wakes’ at Mint Theater Company

Long buried in a box marked “forgotten” was this remarkable play, now unearthed by Jonathan Banks’ Mint Theater Company, which has brought it back to shimmering life for a run at the Beckett Theatre...

Review: ‘The Consul, The Tramp, and America’s Sweetheart’ at Best Medicine Rep Theater Company

This sold out production by local playwright John Morogiello and directed by Rabbi Stan Levin touched on so many current and historical hot points that I wonder how it all happened in ninety...

Review: ‘All The Things You Are: Jerome Kern’ at The In Series

As the Great American Songbook continues to recede from its long-held prominence, productions such as the In Series All the Things You Are: Jerome Kern are priceless for those who want to hear the...

Review: ‘The Wolves’ at Studio Theatre (Women’s Voices Theater Festival)

If the Women’s Voices Theater Festival existed only to give us Sarah DeLappe’s The Wolves, it would be worth it. But we have more than 20 other new plays by female playwrights to enjoy in this year’s...

Review: ‘Waxing West’ at 4615 Theatre Company (Women’s Voices Theater Festival)

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” So said F. Scott Fitzgerald, at the end of The Great Gatsby. Waxing West, by Saviana Stanescu, is the story of a...

Review: ‘Passing Strange’ at The Wilma Theater

“Life is a mistake that only art can correct.” That’s not a line you’d expect to hear at a rock and roll show, is it? But Passing Strange isn’t your typical rock show, or musical, or biography. It...

Review: ‘The Trial’ at Synetic Theater

The creative, resourceful folk from Synetic Theater have made another date with an old friend and literary powerhouse, well beyond the “silent” Shakespeare for which it is justly known. The author is...

Review: ‘The Addams Family Young @ Part’ at Ovations Junior Company

Ovations Theatre’s The Addams Family Young @ Part brings a fresh and original storyline to the beloved, if unconventional, family with a penchant for all things macabre. The Ovations Junior Company...

Review: ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’ at Zemfira Stage

As you’re spending January shivering against these sub-freezing wind-chills and bracing yourselves for the next bombogenesis, I strongly urge you to seek refuge in Falls Church with Tennessee...

In the Moment: ‘The Way of the World’ at Folger Theatre (Women’s Voices Theatre Festival)

There’s lots to like about Theresa Rebeck’s The Way of the World just as my DC Theater Arts colleague Sophia Howes points out in her review. The show is the Folger Theater’s Women’s Voices Theater...

Review: ‘See Rock City’ at Washington Stage Guild

Last night I had the pleasure of my first trip to the Washington Stage Guild to see See Rock City at the Undercroft Theatre in Washington, D.C. When you visit, you will find this theater tucked in the...

Review: ‘Peter and the Starcatcher’ by Reston Community Players

Based on the 2005 book by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson, Peter and the Starcatcher is a Tony Award-winning play by Rick Elice, with music by Wayne Barker. A lively production opened Friday, January...