Washington DC

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Lil’ Women: a rap musical’

Are you searching for a 19th century story set to 21st century hip-hop, but not willing to cough up thousands of dollars for Hamilton tickets? Lil’ Women: a rap musical may be exactly what you’re...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘One Man Romeo’

The young actor and rapper Darius McCall fell so much in love with the role of Romeo that he longed to bring the character to life, by himself, alone on stage with but Shakespeare’s words and his own...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Let Trump Be Trump’

Imagine, if you can, that it is July 2017 and Donald J. Trump has been elected as the 45th President of the United States. While some of you might find that prospect wonderful and others horrifying,...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Rapists and Drug Dealers’

This surreal drama, by Tim Chamberlain, is a combination of modern dance and theater. The play opens with the attempted murder of WOMAN by MAN. She is able to thwart his attempt with the help of two...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Play Cupid’

New Game Theatre has created a show to satisfy the matchmaking itch in even your most meddling friend. In Play Cupid the actors relinquish their power and the audience takes control. There was a...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Wash Over You’

Get ready for a distinctly American piece of multi-media artistry told in choreography, text and video projections by Artistic Director Jane Franklin of Jane Franklin Dance in Arlington, Va. With...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Death Be Not Loud!’

Susan Jackson’s new play, Death Be Not Loud—produced by the Southern Railroad Theatre Company and billed as “a contemporary Southern comedy”—is a sweet reflection on love and loss, featuring two...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Hello|Brother’

Edgy, experimental, and often uncomfortable, Annexus Theatre’s production of Hello|Brother is the quintessential Fringe experience. Written and directed by Solomon HaileSelassie, the companion plays...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Once Upon a Bedtime’

The Silver Finch Arts Collective is back at the Fringe Festival with their first children’s show: Once Upon a Bedtime. But what a sophisticated children’s show! Five skilled musicians lead a cast of...

2016 Capital Fringe Review ‘…and a Ghost Grrl’

The King’s Players are presenting an exploration of modern love and supernatural forces, by Founding Artistic Director Timothy R. King, at the Trinidad Theatre for the 2016 Capital Fringe Festival....

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Color Theory’

Magic: The Gathering, a trading card game representing epic battles between wizards, has an estimated 20 million active players worldwide. Judging from the enthusiastic reaction of the audience at the...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘PowerPlays’

This clever play is composed of five vignettes with a talented cast and minimalist stage, written by ‘The Gang of Five’: Marilyn Bennett, J T Caruso, Dimitri Neos, Michelle Rago, and Sarah Dimont...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Ain’t That Rich’

In Ain’t that Rich, California-based writer and comedian Kate Robards delivers a dazzling solo performance, one as mesmerizing and powerful as it is funny. The show is now making its debut at the...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Hunt’

Jean P. Bordewich’s political drama Hunt turns back the clock to a divisive time in American politics – the early 1950s of Joseph McCarthy – but the characters and issues resonate in today’s political...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Connectivity/Complexity’

Errant Movement took to the stage of Gallaudet University’s Elstad Auditorium on ‘opening night’ of the Capital Fringe 2016 festival, with sole responsibility handed to the talented workings of seven...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘SuperNOVA’

SuperNOVA, a political satire fit for the ridiculous times we find ourselves in, combines music and millennial wit to great effect as it depicts a new secessionist frenzy gripping northern Virginia...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘JUICED’

JUICED, directed by and staring the three members of Tia Nina (Leah Curran Moon, Ilana Silverstein, and Lisi Stoessel) is weird. It is ridiculous. It ignores all theatrical and performative...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Complexity: A One Woman Show’

It’s a typical love story, but with more rejection. In the Whit West Theatre Company’s musical, Complexity: A One Woman Show, directed by Ileana Fortuno and choreographed by Katie Kiessling, Beth...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Kick Before You Drown’

A solid show with impressive acrobatics, Kick Before You Drown presents Cirque which will easily please fans of the genre. It is important to note that Kick Before You Drown is as different from a...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Glacier: a climate change ballet’

Midway through Glacier: a climate change ballet, a lone dancer, Therese Gahl, glided onto the stage. Costumed in a vibrant blue tutu, her long legs and arms and their deep earth tones, she captured...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Different, Damaged, Damned’

The short but powerful Different, Damaged, Damned explores the relationship and resentments between a father Ralph (Jeremy Keith Hunter) and his high-school age son Chamuel (Austin Farrow). Written by...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The DOMA Diaries’

Thrilling progressive history and the trajectory of societal forces colliding with basic human rights is delineated through the prism of three couples who are fighting for their dignity as LGBTQ...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Greatest Science Fiction Show (No One’s Ever Seen)’

The Greatest Science Fiction Show (No One’s Ever Seen) delivers a riotous parody of classic science fiction and pop culture. Hilarious, and a must-see for anyone who considers themselves fans of...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Perfect Liars Club’

If you’ve never been to a storytelling show before, hold on to your hats. Perfect Liars Club—directed loosely and hilariously by Cara Foran & Pierce McManus for the 2016 Capital Fringe Festival—is the...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘I Found That The Sun Will Rise Tomorrow’

Anna Snapp gives a robust, witty, and protean performance in this genuinely candid and insightful solo theater piece. Self-authored, and based on her own life, I Found That the Sun Will Rise Tomorrow...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘In a Day of Dreary’

In a Day of Dreary, written and directed by Henry Ragan, explores one day in the life of a charming and perpetually frustrated girl named, yes, Dreary. Ragan, who also plays Dreary’s boyfriend in the...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Tragedy of Mario and Juliet’

The Tragedy of Mario and Juliet, presented by Dead Cat Productions/Wayne Nicolosi (as well as written and directed by Nicolosi), reinvents well-known Shakespearean characters and plots to explore some...

Capital Fringe Preview #50: ‘H5x7’ by William Shakespeare, Adapted and Directed by Kevin O’Connell

Capital Fringe Preview: H5x7 by William Shakespeare, adapted and directed by Kevin O’Connell “Suppose within the girdles of these walls,” begins Shakespeare’s Henry V, “Are now confined two mighty...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Real World: Kabul’

The Real World: Kabul is a comedy based on real events of three American writers who traveled to Afghanistan in 2009 to write, of all things, a soap opera for the Muslim world’s “biggest media mogul.”...

2016 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Golden Smile’

It is probably not a good idea, near the end of a maniacally inscrutable and incessantly unfunny musical, to have one character sing, apropos the show, “It’s over! It’s done!” and then have another...

Contemporary American Theater Festival (CATF) Playwrights Interviews: Part 5: Chisa Hutchinson and “The Wedding Gift” by Sharon J. Anderson

Here is Part 5 of 5 in a series of interviews by Sharon J. Anderson, Contemporary American Theater Festival Trustee/Professional Story Listener and Creative Director. Meet Playwright Chisa Hutchinson...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #49: ‘The Tragedy of Mario and Juliet’ by Wayne Nicolosi

From the Author Wayne Nicolosi: Growing up in New Jersey, every day was filled with natural, working-class comedians and poets. Whether mowing lawns, fixing cars or sitting at the bar, they told...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #48: ‘Coping’ by Jacob Marx Rice

Award-winning new play examines the heartbreak and humor of death. The story of Coping began with a tragedy; a friend of Playwright Jacob Marx Rice, who had been struggling with depression for years,...

‘The Music of Andrew Lloyd Webber’ Ends its Run This Sunday At Riverside Center for The Performing Arts

Last year’s audience pleaser and hit The Music of Andrew Lloyd Webber ends its run this Sunday, July 10th at 1 PM at Riverside Center for The Arts. There is a Sunday Matinee on July 10th: Arrive for...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #46: ’22 Boom!’: 5 Questions with ’22 Boom!’ Playwright Miranda Rose Hall by Angela Kay Pirko and Miranda Rose Hall

5 Questions with 22 Boom! playwright Miranda Rose Hall by Angela Kay Pirko and Miranda Rose Hall Angela: What was the inspiration for 22 Boom! Miranda: It was a compilation of plays that I wrote on...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #45: ‘Let Trump Be Trump’ by Kendall Helblig

Trump’s Theatrics Play Out On The Fringe Festival Stage Believe it or not, John Krizel had the idea and title for his play Let Trump Be Trump months before the slogan, a wink to The West Wing wonks,...

Review: Bob Dylan at Wolf Trap With Mavis Staples

Bob Dylan and the balmy air of the Mid-Atlantic summer: the folksy voice of an era and the backwoods feel of Wolf Trap seem like they were meant to go together. However, for those fans hoping for a...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #43: ‘Do Not Disturb’ by Carla Rountree

What happens when you combine opera with an episode of Frasier? You get a comedy of operatic proportions. You get Do Not Disturb, which will be presented by The Forgotten Opera Company in this year’s...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #42: ‘One Mutual Happiness’ by David S. Kessler

What is One Mutual Happiness? Take one totally unqualified wedding officiant, toss in an innovative composer, mix with four weddings and one prolonged illness. Add a generous scoop or two of laughs...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #41: ‘Perfect Liars Club’ by Pierce McManus

Perfect Liars Club: The Smash Hit Storytelling Interrogation Returns to Capital Fringe “…storytelling at its finest — honest.” — The Washington Post Maybe you’ve been to a storytelling show before,...

‘Come to Their Cabaret’: Meet the Cast of PWLT’s ‘Cabaret’: Part 1: Aaron Verchot-Ware and Katherine Bisulca

In Part 1 of a series of interviews with the cast of Prince William Little Theatre’s production of Cabaret, meet Aaron Verchot-Ware and Katherine Bisulca. Joel: Please introduce yourself, and tell us...

A New Play and a New Mission for Ginger Dayle and New City Stage Company in Philadelphia

When Ginger Dayle founded New City Stage Company in the summer of 2006, she was a graduate student at Villanova University, hoping to provide herself and other young theater artists with professional...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #40: ‘It Will All Make Sense in the Morning’ by Patrick Miller

We knew it had to be the blood eggs. When you’re only given four minutes to present your play at the Fringe Preview night, it focuses you. You’ve been immersed in a rich, funny, tragic, touching...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #39: ‘The Greatest Science Fiction Show (no one’s ever seen)’ by Pamela Leahigh

Take a trip with us through time and space! Grain of Sand Theatre, winner of the Capital Fringe Festival’s Best Drama Awards in 2011 and 2013, returns to the Capital Fringe Festival with The Greatest...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #38: ‘Poe, Times Two’ by Richard Byrne

The life of Edgar Allan Poe is a subject of endless and fascinated discussion and debate. But at the core of our fascination with Poe is the work itself – his poems, and literary criticism, and most...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #36: ‘Kick Before You Drown’ by Jessica John

Steal A Step World Premieres Kick Before You Drown at the Capital Fringe Festival on July 7-14, 2016 Genre-bending company debuts a provocative show melding contemporary circus and performance art...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #35: ‘Aliens, Nazis & Angels’: A solo play by Leah Harris

Mental illness, addiction, and inherited family trauma: these are the ingredients from which Leah Harris spins her solo performance. Working with Director Regie Cabico, she mined her painful family...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #37: ‘Play Cupid’ by Brett Steven Abelman

We might have been on over 100 dates between the seven us – in fact I’m betting that’s a low estimate. Myself (creator/director Brett Steven Abelman), assistant director Emily Cohen, and Play Cupid’s...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #34: ‘Macbeth in the Basement’ by Annie Bryan

181 school shootings have occurred in the United States since the Columbine shooting on April 20, 1999. 231 young people died from gun violence in their place of education. High school students...

2016 Capital Fringe Preview #33 ‘Prison Break Incorporated’ by Derek Hills

You’ve run marathons in Kuala Lumpur, did the half Ironman in Hawaii, and proved your mettle on the now-quaint Tough Mudder race course as well as its clones. But where to go for your next adrenaline...