Washington DC

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘My Lack of a Social Life’

Douglas Stafford is a very talented juggler. If that is an interest of yours, if you like juggling, and you’ve got an hour, then you may like this show. Stafford is pretty good as a magician. If you...

Review: ‘Cabaret’ at The Kennedy Center

Cabaret, the blistering musical satire written more than 50 years ago by John Kander and Fred Ebb, stormed into The Kennedy Center this week with a performance that had the audience on its feet, and...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Help Me, Wanda!’

Toni Rae Salmi is an actor seen frequently on DC stages, most recently “enjoyably grand” in Perfect Arrangement at Source Festival. In Help Me, Wanda!, she belts out a rockin’ song list—much of it...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Proper Care of the Peace Lily’

There are no absolutes in Proper Care of the Peace Lily. In this 100-minute performance, everything exists in relation: analogies, power differentials, and those actual familial relations that define...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Regulars’

By far the best show I have seen at Fringe so far this year, The Regulars will have you laughing in your seat, squealing at insider “DC” jokes and dancing in the aisles, (Really, be prepared. They...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Shinka’

The post World War II Japanese dance theatre form, Butoh, is traditionally performed in white body make-up. Slow controlled movement, body tension and muscular involvement may rely on elaborate...

Review: ‘The Originalist’ at Arena Stage at The Mead Center for American Theater

The original The Originalist returns to Arena in a much larger house (The Kreeger, not the Kogod Cradle where it debuted in 2015). This is fitting. The play, the performances, and the production are...

Preview: ‘The Carol Burnett Show’ at the Laurel Mill Playhouse

This weekend, Laurel Mill Playhouse (LMP) will be doing two tributes. The first is to the wonderful Carol Burnett Show that graced our TVs from 1967-1978. The show included those wonderful comedic...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Repentance’

A light night of theater Repentance is not. In one uninterrupted dialogue that unfolds over the course of 90 minutes, Repentance tells a story of mental anguish, power games and abuse. William Aitken...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Heroes’ Tale’

Four black men in their forties sit around a chess game in Dupont Circle park in 1980. They open the show singing barbershop-quartet style, an upbeat song about themselves: They are the 1342 Dupont...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Kara Sevda’

Let’s get this part out of the way quickly: Lisa VillaMil’s Kara Sevda (at Shopkeepers through July 22) is an exhilarating piece of theater, masterfully and assuredly directed by Kat Haan, beautifully...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Dancing Through Life…By the Way’

Dancing Through Life…By the Way is a one-man show starring Christopher Bennett. No director is credited in the Playbill, but it appears that Mr. Bennett did the majority of the heavy lifting here. He...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Arden Now’

“My employer is an asshole.” Shakespeare said that. Ok, not exactly. But the Rude Mechanicals somehow fit the line seamlessly into Arden Now, their abbreviated and modified – yet still spoken in verse...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘ClickB@it’

Internet addiction is no laughing matter. However, for the talented team now lighting up the stage at the Sprenger Theatre at Atlas, the Internet–and all the craziness it has produced–is the stuff of...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Aflight’

There is no doubt in my mind that Jane Franklin Dance’s Aflight brings something special to Fringe. Usually based in Arlington, this group blends music, dance, and visual art in a way that is not only...

Review: ‘Empanada For A Dream’ at 1st Stage

Proust may have had his mother’s madeleine, but Juan Francisco Villa has his mother’s empanada to stir up memories of his gritty, hard scrabble childhood in New York’s City’s Lower East Side. It was a...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Garbage Person Karaoke’

Over the 65-minute run time of Caroline Bennett’s Garbage Person Karaoke, there are moments of painful comedy and bitter emotional connections with that specific kind of heartbreak that kicks the...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘There Ain’t No More’

Willie Carlisle is an astonishing performer, and if I were only reviewing his performance of mountain folk music, I’d recommend this show with the entirety of my full heart. Guitar, banjo, squeeze...

Review: ‘Gigi’ at Washington County Playhouse

For a taste of France and classic musical theatre, Washington County Playhouse in Hagerstown is serving Lerner and Lowe’s Gigi through August 5th. It is a rarely produced musical, faithfully remounted...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Exit, Pursued by a Bear’ at Barabbas Theatre

Exit, Pursued by a Bear, produced by Barabbas Theatre for their 2017 CapFringe entry and directed by Kevin O’Connell, is a welcome DC introduction to Lauren Gunderson’s pithy, ratatat meta riff on...

Review: ‘Hick: A Love Story’ at 1st Stage

What was hidden away as a purposefully invisible sidebar of decades-old history, is brought to well-deserved notice by 1st Stage’s inaugural Logan Festival of Solo Performances. With Hick: A Love...

Review: ‘We Found the Wild Things’ at Who What Where Theater Collective

It is New Year’s Eve, 2015, and seven high school seniors have gathered at the home of the twins, Nicole (Skye Lindberg) and August (Zachary Wilcox). There’s Maisy (Catherine Anne Gilbert), quiet,...

2017 Capitol Fringe Review: ‘Show Business 101’

Welcome to show business! And welcome to Show Business 101, the comedy revue where four talented actors burst on and off the stage offering send-ups of various show biz situations, real and imaginary....

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘LIFE: A Comic Opera in Three Short Acts’

LIFE: A Comic Opera in Three Short Acts is neither quite an opera nor a musical; it is not a really a comedy or a drama. It’s a bit of everything, using classical music, Broadway, doo-wop, and more to...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Paper’

A cluttered desk, a twenty-minute appointment, a student and a teacher, and what ensues are cerebral twists and turns, well beyond the subdued, weightiness of departmental office hours. We inhabit...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘This Too Comes By Hard’

No way around it, this is a dark, harsh, and gritty domestic drama. For some, it may be too dark, too harsh, too gritty, perhaps a partner violence trigger. A fun, frothy, feel-good frolic this show...

Review: ‘A Little Princess’ at Aldersgate Church Community Theater by Debra Cope

The timeless story of kind and courageous young heroine Sara Crewe comes to life on an Alexandria stage in A Little Princess, a new adaptation of the classic Frances Hodgson Burnett novel by Lauren...

Review: ‘Dial ‘M’ for Murder’ at Sandy Spring Theatre Group by Robin Lynch

Now playing at the Kentland’s Arts Barn, Dial ‘M’ For Murder by the Sandy Spring Theatre Group has a lot to offer those who enjoy a mystery-thriller. First of all, it’s a really good play (that always...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Exit Carolyn’

I love Fringe. And like many theatergoers, I head off each day with tolerance and hope. The tolerance is for shows that are long on ambition, and the hope is for something more. Imagine my surprise at...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘To Be or Not To Be In Love – That Is The Question?’

Sitting in the audience of To Be or Not To Be In Love – That Is The Question?, a one-woman cabaret starring writer-choreographer Beverly Merella, might be the modern equivalent of attending a Florence...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Release: A Rock Opera’

An exciting aspect of CapFringe is getting a sneak peek at a new show in the first stage of development. Such is the case with DC Dogs’ Release: A Rock Opera, now playing at the Gallaudet University...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Tiresias’ Tits’

Tiresias’ Tits is a self-described satirical, surreal, burlesque (fun fact – the author of the ur-source material, The Breasts of Tiresias, Guillaume Apollinaire, is responsible for giving us the word...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Not Quite: Asian American by Law, Asian Woman by Desire’

See this show. Stop reading this review, click this hyperlink, buy a ticket, and see it. Don’t want to go alone? I’ll see it with you. We’ve never met before? Who cares. I’m your new best friend for...

Review: ‘The Happiest Place on Earth’ at The Hub Theatre

Set in a fictionalized American magical kingdom, The Happiest Place on Earth, now playing at Hub Theatre, is a wonderfully bittersweet family saga that actor Tia Shearer crushes in her solo...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Ghouls’

There is a moment in Sean Surla’s one-woman piece, Ghouls, where Emel Haddad – Surla’s stand-in for herself, and an extraordinarily generous actress – describes driving to the top of Pike’s Peak with...

Review: ‘Fabulation or the Re-education of Undine’ at Port City Playhouse

Lynn Nottage’s Fabulation or the Re-education of Undine is an outrageously hilarious romp into the fabulated life of Undine Barnes Callas, a feisty, successful African American woman whose comeuppance...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Hexagon 2017: Let Freedom Zing’

Described as “D.C.’s only all-original political satirical musical comedy troupe,” Hexagon gives a musical zing to the political madness of the past year. Now in its 62nd year, Hexagon brings its...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Words She Gave Me’

The Words She Gave Me, Solia Bickersteth’s ambitious multimedia project, is a bighearted and moving exploration of how African-American women have shaped one another’s concept of womanhood. Sisterhood...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Life, Death & Everything In-Between’

Large swatches of fabric move time forward or weave through space. The bold colors catch the eye. Confrontational dialogue sets characters in opposition while bodies remain static or surge forward...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Lazarus’

The notion that medical technology will one day enable human beings to live indefinitely is not just science fiction. Preventing the aging process (or “ending aging”) is an actual field of scientific...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Caveat’

Caveat (written and directed by Ben Lockshin and playing at Gallaudet University’s Eastman Studio Theater) is a “One’s-a” show, where each character is an idea of a person more than an actual person....

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Four Broke Guys: LIVE!’

Four Broke Guys: LIVE! is classified as a comedy, but don’t expect mere fluff or pratfalls from this one-man show. Actor and playwright J. Shawn Durham’s sequence of four monologues from four separate...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Constructive Fictions’

Was ever a jailed sex offender more self-righteous and self-pitying than Rabbi Barry Freundel in this brilliantly disturbing new play by A. J. Campbell? Were ever such a predator’s’ victims—in...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Quantum Suicide: A Talk by Professor Sophie Miller’

You don’t have to understand quantum mechanics – or even elementary physics – to follow Quantum Suicide: A Talk by Professor Sophie Miller, the one woman show now enjoying its first Fringe production...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Morningstar’

Morningstar is a small chamber drama playing in the basement of Shopkeeper’s on Florida Ave, (a venue whose old wooden floors add quite a bit of natural folly to the performance, some useful, though...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Wit & Wrath: The Life and Times of Dorothy Parker’

Dorothy Parker claimed, famously, that she was “just a little Jewish girl, trying to be cute.” In fact, she was a legendary wit; the first female drama critic in America; and a successful writer of...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Thomas Jefferson Hoochie-Coochie Man’

With a breezy “Hi, y’all!” Clyde Ensslin welcomes us to the complicated story of Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, as told by none other than Big Bill Clinton himself. It’s a chance to relax, enjoy,...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Ready to Serve: Remember the Nurses’

Stories of war wounded told from the point of view of military medics—those who try to save lives and bag the bodies of the ones they can’t—give glimpses into the bravery and heroism of the fighting...

2017 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Poetry Cabaret’

This isn’t your normal poetry reading. Those words, spoken by Creator and Director Caleb Beissert as he introduced the Asheville-based Poetry Cabaret Collective, could serve as the tagline for the...

Capital Fringe Preview: Mike Bartlett’s ‘Contractions’ by Julia M. Hurley

Mike Bartlett’s Contractions, directed by Julia M. Hurley, comes to DC this summer and will be performed at the Logan Fringe Arts Space. This production is presented as a part of the 2017 Capital...