2017

Report: ‘National Symphony Orchestra Season Opening Gala Performance’ Conducted by Maestro Gianandrea Noseda and Featuring Yo-Yo Ma and Cynthia Erivo

Listen up, DC! There is a new Maestro in town. Maestro Gianandrea Noseda, whose impressive resume ranks him as one of the world’s most sought after conductors, opened his inaugural season as music...

Review: ‘Mary Jane’ at The New York Theatre Workshop

The New York Theatre Workshop on East 4th Street in the East Village is a small but potent force in the theater community. Its mandate is to offer production of new works which deal with issues of the...

A Recap of The 2017 New York Innovative Theatre Awards at the Gerald W. Lynch Theatre

It was a night filled with excitement, laughs, and unbridled passion for indie theater as the New York Innovative Theatre Foundation celebrated the outstanding achievements of Off-Off-Broadway for its...

Review: ‘Something Wicked This Way Comes’ at Delaware Theatre Company

What’s the most impressive technical production in the area? What’s just as astounding as Disney World or any show on Broadway? It’s Delaware Theatre Company’s Something Wicked This Way Comes, a world...

Review: ‘We Shall Not Be Moved’ by Opera Philadelphia

The sole Philadelphia-based offering in Opera Philadelphia’s O17 Festival is We Shall Not Be Moved. Its powerful message is that the city’s children, and particularly its black children, are deprived...

Review: ‘War Stories’ by Opera Philadelphia

War Stories is a clever pairing of two music dramas dealing with battles, presented by Opera Philadelphia as part of its O17 Festival. The two separate compositions are staged in adjacent areas of the...

Review: ‘The Liar’ at Compass Rose Theater

Compass Rose Theater’s production of The Liar is a hilarious farce with a great deal of charm. Written by acclaimed Restoration French playwright Pierre Corneille in 1642, it became his most famous...

Review: The In Series: Mozart’s ‘The Magic Flute’ at the D.C. Scottish Rite Temple

If you’re a Mozart fan – and if you aren’t, you should be – you probably have your favorite ‘conspiracy theory’ about why the composer met his untimely death at the age of 35. Thanks to Peter...

Review: ‘Into the Woods’ at Fredericktowne Players

Into the Woods, with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by James Lapine, is now playing at the JBK Theater at the Frederick Community College, presented by the Fredericktowne Players. Into...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Kink Haüs’ by Gunnar Montana at The Latvian Society

Sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll have long been the rallying cry of post-modern youth, and Gunnar Montana takes that hedonistic call to its most emphatic, explicit, and artistic extremes in Kink Haüs....

Report: Kelli O’Hara Performs at the ARTS by George Benefit at George Mason University

Kelli O’Hara’s concert last night was the culmination of a wonderful evening at George Mason University’s “ARTS by George” benefit. The concert hall at the Center for the Arts was full of an...

Review: ‘Carousel’ at The Media Theatre

Musical Heaven. Is there a better way to describe the production of Carousel at the Media Theatre? It would be hard to find a better-sung production than that given by the surpassingly youthful...

Review: ‘Rock and Roll Man: The Alan Freed Story’ at Bucks County Playhouse

Who was the first rock and roller? You could say it was Elvis Presley, the first rock and roll superstar. Or Bill Haley, the first rocker to have a number one hit. Or maybe it was Ray Charles, or Fats...

Review: ‘Nunsense’ at Potomac Playmakers

Something funny is going on at Potomac Playmakers in Hagerstown, Maryland! It’s a new production of Nunsense, an interactive musical with book, music, and lyrics by Dan Goggins. Anyone who grew up...

Review: ‘Bernstein on Broadway’ at The Kennedy Center

It was a glorious evening for Leonard Bernstein and musical theater fans at The Kennedy Center. It was the exceptional, one-night-only opening to the worldwide celebration of Leonard Bernstein’s...

Review: ‘How I Became a Pirate’ at Adventure Theatre MTC

A few days ago, you might have heard more than your fair share of “scallywags” and “lily-livered land lubbers” if an acquaintance or loved one elected to celebrate International Talk Like a Pirate...

Post-Play Palaver: ‘Lela & Co.’ by Factory 449 at The Anacostia Arts Center

Post-Play Palaver is an occasional series of conversations between DC Theater Arts writers who saw the same performance, got really into talking about it, and decided to continue their exchange in...

Review: ‘Bridges of Madison County’ at Red Branch Theatre Company

The Bridges of Madison County turns out to be an ideal musical for an ambitious youth theater looking to build bridges to a wider audience of grown-up fans. A sensitive, artfully realized production...

Review: ‘The Hound of the Baskervilles’ at Port Tobacco Players

Sherlock Holmes is an enduring character in the annals of detective fiction. A master of deduction, Holmes has been the subject of countless movies and plays, one of the most famous of which was The...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘A Period of Animate Existence’ by Pig Iron Theatre Company

If you open the dictionary and look up the word ‘life,’ one entry reads: ‘a period of animate existence.’ Composer Troy Herion gives this explanation for the title of Pig Iron Theatre Company’s newest...

Review: World Premiere of ‘The Wake World’ by Opera Philadelphia

Inside a museum dedicated to art from the past, the O17 Festival has brought a new opera which celebrates musical and literary styles from the past. Composer/librettist David Hertzberg built upon...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Cymbeline’ by Revolution Shakespeare at Hawthorne Park

For its fourth annual Fringe offering, Revolution Shakespeare returns to South Philadelphia’s Hawthorne Park with another free outdoor selection from the Bard’s canon. This year’s production (and the...

Magic Time!: ‘The Arsonists’ at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company

In a recent satire published on Medium, the San Francisco writer/actor/comedian Alison Page listed five dozen “Honest Theatre Awards.” Among them was one that struck me as an apt accolade for the...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Joan Crawford in Her Own Words’ by JC Productions at Tabu Lounge & Bar

Created by Michael McHugh, directed by Peter Tupitza, and starring the fabulous Eric Singel, JC Productions’ revival of Joan Crawford in Her Own Words reunites the show’s original team for a revamped...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Bind’ by Corinna Burns at The Drake

Corinna Burns is not just skilled at acting, she’s also a superb writer and an enthralling storyteller, and she’s proving it once again in this year’s Fringe Festival with Bind. Her latest original...

Review: Sondra Radvanovsky in Recital at Opera Philadelphia

Sondra Radvanovsky’s recital as part of Opera Philadelphia’s O17 Festival was a spectacular event. That may seem like an oxymoron to some readers, who expect singer/pianist recitals to be intimate...

Event: ‘MUCHO KLUNCHO TALENT SHOW a Parade of Raw Ridiculousness’ Presented by The Klunch

Opera singers, jugglers, tango dancers, strippers, puppets, and way more gather for the Mucho KlunchoTalent Show! An epic assemblage of talent, the likes of which DC hasn’t seen in centuries;...

Review: ‘Native Gardens’ at Arena Stage

Native Gardens is a bloomin’ hysterical comedy at Arena Stage Need something to boost you up? Perhaps something to make you, temporarily, forget the current political and social climate? Or, the...

Review: ‘Respect! A Tribute to Aretha Franklin’ at the American Pops Orchestra

Five fabulous divas joined the innovative new American Pops Orchestra to celebrate the music of Aretha Franklin at the Arena Stage’s Fichandler Stage on September 16. An energized audience sang,...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘#CocktailPlays’ by Juniper Productions at Philadelphia Distilling

For its inaugural offering in the Fringe, Juniper Productions, founded earlier this year, partners with Philadelphia Distilling for a themed site-specific presentation of four commissioned short...

In the Moment: Matt Haimovitz Brings Mobile Music to Northern Virginia

In these days of the end of the brick-and-mortar retail shops, and in these times when new audiences are less likely to purchase subscriptions to the performing arts as Baby Boomers once did, what can...

Review: ‘Ripcord’ at South Camden Theatre Company

Ripcord is the story of a cutthroat battle of practical jokes and dirty tricks between two women in an assisted-living residence for the elderly. Does that seem unlikely? Then you’ve never met Abby...

Review: ‘Lady M’ – A Co-Production of Collective Eleven, Women from Mars and Gitana Theatre at Atlas Performing Arts Center

In the first scene of LadyM, a show devised by Francesca Chilcote, Rachel Hynes, Vanita Kalra, and Anastasia Wilson, a woman dressed in white dumps an entire bottle of ketchup onto a burger. She tears...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘(insert thoughts here)’ by Bradley’s Bucks at Franky Bradley’s

In a delectable mash-up of the 2017 Fringe with an extended Restaurant Week, Franky Bradley’s gives festival-goers the option of enjoying dinner while attending the latest all-new offering by its...

Review: ‘The Addams Family’ at Washington County Playhouse

The Addams Family, made famous by American cartoonist Charles Addams in 1938 in The New Yorker, became well-loved in the 1960s when adapted for television, starring John Astin and Carolyn Jones. This...

Review: ‘Simpatico’ at McCarter Theatre Center

“Do you want to talk, or do you want to be cryptic and weird?” Those words – which sound like they might belong in a lot of Sam Shepard’s plays – appear in the first scene of Shepard’s Simpatico. And...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Marx in Soho’ by Iron Age Theatre/Radical Acts at the Ethical Society of Philadelphia

Actor and activist Bob Weick is back in the Fringe with his signature touring show Marx in Soho by Howard Zinn, which he first performed in the festival in 2004. Presented by Iron Age Theatre/Radical...

Review: ‘I Killed My Mother’ at Spooky Action Theater

Andras Viskey’s I Killed My Mother, now in production at Spooky Action Theater, is a challenging bit of business. Its wordless opening is several minutes of wandering by various members of the company...

Review: ‘Deathtrap’ at Silver Spring Stage

The opening of Ira Levin’s Deathtrap this weekend marked the start of the 50th Season for Silver Spring Stage. The play, which opened on Broadway in the late 1970s, is a suspense thriller with lots of...

Review: ‘SEVENTY IV SECONDS… to judgment’ by GoKash OnSTAGE at Arden Theatre Company

Who decides who lives or dies, and how is that just? These are the questions playwright Kash Goins implores audiences to think about in his new play SEVENTY IV SECONDS… to judgment at the Arden...

2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘Mistress of the Maze’ by WeftWorks at CHI Movements Art Center

Hypnotic, transportive, and exquisitely beautiful, Mistress of the Maze marks the unforgettable debut of WeftWorks with its stunning world-premiere performance in the 2017 Fringe. Created,...

Review: ‘Cheeks’ at Plays and Players Theatre

First things first: Lee Minora’s solo show Cheeks is a laugh riot. Do not miss an opportunity to see this show. It is both whip smart and hysterical (both in the colloquial meaning and a feminist...

Review: ‘Funny Girl’ at Candlelight Dinner Theatre

What would you rather see: Fanny Brice singing on a tugboat in New York harbor, or a real live Fanny Brice in the Ziegfeld Follies? Funny Girl, the original 1964 Broadway musical, is a real stage...

Review: ‘Rapture, Blister, Burn’ at Peter’s Alley Theatre Productions

In these days of constant bombast and weaponized words, when sounding reasonable and wanting to be open to another person’s point of view sounds almost quaint, Peter’s Alley Theatre has taken a quiet...

Review: ‘The Christians’ at Baltimore Center Stage

Spearheading a “season of community” and stimulating thought-provoking dialogue, Baltimore Center Stage headlines the first production of its 2017/18 span in electrifying fashion with rising...

Review: ‘Clover’ at Ally Theatre Company

But suicides have a special language. Like carpenters, they want to know which tools; They never ask why build. — Anne Sexton, “Wanting to Die” Laura Rocklyn and Ty Hallmark’s new work, Clover, now...

Review: ‘Lela & Co.’ by Factory 449 at The Anacostia Arts Center

The story of Cordelia Lynn’s Lela & Co. is a universal story, told across many borders and many nationalities, ethnicities, and races; during wartime and peacetime, at Super Bowls, World Cups, and...

Review: ‘Sally McCoy’ at Cohesion Theatre Company

“Every man on earth would kill for somethin’. Any says different – jus’ ain’t found out wha’s worth killin’ for yet.” – Devil Anse Hatfield, in Sally McCoy In the middle of the night of August 9,...

Review: ‘The Canterville Ghost’ at The Montgomery Playhouse

Just as you are taking down your Labor Day bunting and searching for last year’s fall decorations, there arrives a bit of spooky mystery and merriment for the whole family to enjoy. The Montgomery...

Review: ‘Any Given Monday’ at Dominion Stage

Moral dilemmas feed the dark humor of Bruce Graham’s Any Given Monday, directed by Jennifer Lyman. Marital infidelity, the loyalty of friendship, the eagerness of youth, and the logic of no logic at...