2015

‘The Ghosts of Versailles’ at The Barns at Wolf Trap

Wolf Trap Opera presents John Corigliano and William M. Hoffman’s The Ghosts of Versailles, a grand opera buffa in two acts. Directed by Louisa Muller, this production is as silly as it is masterful,...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Poe Whitman’: ‘Embodying Poe’

Embodying Poe is the second offering of Robert Michael Oliver’s 2-part 2015 Capital Fringe ‘Poetry in Performance’ called Poe Whitman (Read Julia Capizzi’s review of Song of Myself: The Walt Whitman...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Wedding Party’

When you hear the phrase “Wedding Party” you tend to think of the stereotypical carbon copy of pretty girls in bright dresses and guys complaining about wearing monkey suits. The Wedding Party at...

‘Jesus Christ Superstar’ at McLean Community Players

Jesus Christ Superstar is a rock n’ roll opera with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyrics by Tim Rice, and the McLean Community Players cast and crew, directed by Kevin and Pamela McCormack, rocks...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Interviews With…’

imagine peering into the minds of each person you pass by with as much ease as changing the channel. Interviews With wraps the thoughts and opinions of classic characters and comical stereotypes, some...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Ten Principles )'(‘

The mission of AWol (A Way of Life) Productions is to “share the values of communities by collaborating, creating, and telling stories of the performing arts.” Its current production fulfills this...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Trueheart: Live’

This stand-up solo performance—featuring Tim Trueheart as himself—starts out as broad comedy. Describing himself as racially mixed—a combination of African-American, Indian, Chinese, and Jewish...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Belle and the Beasties’

Those who imagine Capital Fringe as a festival with a wealth of heart and a dearth of sophistication, especially in the realm of production design, have clearly not seen the breathtaking costumes and...

‘Leto Legend’ at Hub Theatre

Valerie Fenton leads an all-woman cast as a super mom, super employee, and superhero in Leto Legend by Kristen LePine. Depicting the dual character of Charlie/Leto, Fenton, a founding member of the...

‘Ballroom with a Twist’ at Strathmore

Celebrity dancers from Dancing with the Stars, along with finalists from So You Think You Can Dance, American Idol, and X Factor shimmied into Bethesda to entertain audiences last night with its...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Burlesque Classique’s Vaudevillian Romp’

The revival of the burlesque is official! There has been a tremendous wave of its return across the country but for those that have been taking part in this cult of personality this is not news....

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Here/Hear’

Richael Faithful, Conjure! Freedom Collective and Ladan Siad, Practice of Creation Studios presents Here/Hear, an interactive experience aimed to explore Black culture within Washington, DC. As the...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘315’

THE Theatre Company presents 315, written by JP Sisneros and directed by Sarah Frances Hope Williams. Since the erection of the George Washington Bridge in 1931, no less than 314 people have used the...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Eulogy’

The tragicomedy of Theater of the Absurd scrambled together with the zaniness of Vaudevillian physical comedy is an apt description for Michael Burgos’s delightfully wacko The Eulogy. Death is in the...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘I Feel Funny: True Misadventures in Stand-Up Comedy’

Ready to have some fun? Well look no further than comedian Adam Ruben’s new one man show I Feel Funny: True Misadventures in Stand-Up Comedy at this year’s Capital Fringe festival. As a seasoned...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘From Seven Layers to a Bikini Top in Less Than Five Hours’

Promising themes abound at this year’s Capital Fringe Festival. Andrea’s Schell’s From Seven Layers to a Bikini Top in Less Than Five Hours is no different, intending to explore the lives of different...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Cold as Death’

It’s hard to be in a love triangle where the girl is dead. Cold as Death, Guillotine Theatre’s offering for this year’s Fringe, revolves around this concept. Rather than submit to the lust of the...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Lathem Prince’

The well-known tragic Hamlet, has left many performers and audience’s opinions open to interpretation. It was Ashlin Halfnight’s adaptation that led to this specific modern day reconstruction, Lathem...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Second Coming of Joan of Arc’

In theatre generally, and in Washington, D.C. particularly, it is quite common for theatre companies to take a classic story and update it in with a contemporary lens. Admirable as this may be, too...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘District of Cara’

District of Cara is like a huge pajama party where your best friend dishes on boyfriends, past and present. In this one-hour monologue/skit/therapy session, actor/writer/storyteller Cara Foran is...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘When We Grow Up’

Critical Point Theatre’s quirky Fringe show When We Grow Up is difficult to review for several reasons. The piece is highly-interactive and its best moments are improvised, meaning you’ll never see...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘I Thought the Earth Remembered Me’

Just steps away from the Monroe Street Arts Walk in Brookland, music fills the humid summer air, canvas tents offer shelter from the hustle of the city, and a company of seven artists and their...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘MacWHAT?!’

Few things are as “Capital Fringe” as an irreverent take on the Bard, and King’s Players have got themselves a hell of an irreverent take in their outrageous farce MacWHAT?! Fittingly enough for...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Suicide Journals’

“Death is inevitable for a young lost soul…” In its world premiere at the 2015 Capital Fringe Festival, The Suicide Journals by Playwright and Director Veronique LaShell MacRae explores the dark,...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘At Your Service, Mr. President!’

This Butler serves up juicy tidbits in his one-man show It’s got to be tough to do a solo show on a sultry summer night, but cool, calm, and seemingly tireless Alan DeValerio pulled it off without a...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘El Sueño or The Delightful Nightmares of the Ladies’

“Expressionism and all other unconventional techniques in drama have only one valid aim, and that is a clear approach to truth.” These words from Tennessee William’s production notes on The Glass...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘No AIDS No Maids: Stories I Can’t F*ckin’ Hear No More’

The image is frightening. A beautiful black woman—larger than life, with a resume to match—dons white gloves and a waistcoat, smears makeup on her face and begins the childish song and dance of a...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘POWER! Stokey Carmichael’

Meshaun Labrone takes the stage as 1960s Civil Rights leader Stokely Carmichael. Carmichael is organizing a protest and the diverse audience, just by being in the room, is taking part. “Leave now if...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘#Sexts’

Today’s obsession with modern technology and its effect on relationships is studied in #Sexts, a humorous little play written and directed by Andy De. We meet a group of young friends gathered for a...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘God: The One-Man Show’

Comedy (according to Steve Martin) is “a distortion of what’s happening, and there will always be something happening.” No truer summary could exist regarding this show; There is always. Something....

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘BOND: An Unauthorised Parody’

Presented by Tasty Monster Productions in association with Gavin Robertson, BOND: An Unauthorised Parody takes the audience on a wildly hilarious spy adventure that will leave fans young and old...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Blind Pug Arts Collective Presents: The Theatre of Self-Loathing Presents: Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf?’

This is a rare opportunity to see the avant-garde Theatre of Self-Loathing, bringing the best of Eastern European theatre to the DC audience. Eddie and Cassilda, winners of the 2003 CAPB Award, are in...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Barenaked Comedy’

Sometimes, you just have to lay it all out there. And yes, I am referring to body parts. Barenaked Comedy, advertised as DC’s premiere hybrid burlesque-standup comedy show, is certainly doing just...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Artful Justice’

History assumes that Adolf Hitler killed himself just before the end of World War II. But what if history were wrong? What if Hitler, acquitted of war crimes by a U.S. court and absolved of genocide...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Awake All Night’

Youth. Vivacity. Not words usually associated with a subject as ancient as Greek gods. Itai Yasur’s Awake All Night, however, presents a new Capital Fringe Festival musical with a young, fresh cast...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘To Err is Falstaff’

There’s nothing a Fringe audience loves more than remixed Shakespeare. And there’s nothing DC loves more than politics. To Err is Falstaff goes right for the jugular, hitting Capital Fringe with both...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Out of Sync’

What happens when memories of your past begin to sabotage your present? Doorway Arts Theatre Company tackles this question head on in Out of Sync, a new play by Katie Woods. In the first scene Nathan...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Hero Complex’

Live Action Theatre more than lives up to its name in its recent production of Hero Complex. The Action starts right away, when aging superhero Eddie Lear (Peter Boyer) accounts his numerous exploits...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Dust to Dust’

This appealing musical is an engaging discovery, performed by The Class Act Players, a theater company of seniors from Robinson Secondary School and Oakton High School in Fairfax. Toby (Preston Kemp),...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Altered Archives’

Memories make us who we are today. Strange as it may seem, the tiniest object may trigger a memory and send us reeling into the past. As part of this year’s Capital Fringe Festival, the dancers of...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘American Lit’

You don’t have to be an English Major—or even a recent graduate—to enjoy this romp among literary giants in American Lit, a collection of five one-act plays, written and directed by James F. Bruns and...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Girl Versus Corinth’

Lights up and fog rolls over the stage. Television screens project images of stars glittering in the night sky. Three silhouettes appear in the eerie lighting and female voices begin to intone a...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Straight Faced Lies’

As is implied by the title of Mark Jason Williams’ bleak comedy Straight Faced Lies, the members of the oppressively dysfunctional Ryan family aren’t very good at this whole honesty thing. Nor are...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Shit Stories: The Best of Our Worst Moments’

As you can probably guess from the title, this is a show about shit. Mostly literal shit, but there’s some figurative shit thrown in for good measure. The 7 storytellers on Team McVey are full of it....

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘SONATA: The Naked Theatre Project’

“Hi. Yes. Okay. Sorry.” For the first three “movements” of the actor symphony SONATA: The Naked Theatre Project, written and directed by Solomon Haileselassie, these are the only words uttered by the...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: “Augustus The Sissy’

Close your eyes during Dana Scott Galloway’s performance of Augustus the Sissy you will be drawn in by his gravelly Texas drawl and the rhythmic pattern of the words he speaks. It’s like listening to...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Salvation Road’

Every year the Fringe produces a few real standouts among its more serious offerings. D.W. Gregory’s thoughtful and funny Salvation Road is an excellent example. Anchored by a talented young cast and...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Good Egg Fables’

Why did the chicken cross the road? To create a heartwarming play devised by Good Egg Community Theatre! Their Good Egg Fables, now playing at Capital Fringe’s Brookland Artspace Lofts, begins with...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Never Never’

Alexandra Petri’s Never Never is absolutely brilliant. It explores a heavy topic – pedophilia – without being overbearingly serious and dark. In fact, it was wildly funny. That said, Petri treated the...

2015 Capital Fringe Review: ‘Brothel’

Playwright Isa Seyran has told forthrightly the origin story of Brothel: Reading about the extreme gender imbalance of men to women in North Dakota resulting from an oil boom thanks to fracking,...