2018

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

If you’ve ever been in an acting class, a group-encounter session, a sensitivity training, or kindergarten, you’ll feel right at home in The Fever. Even if you’re by nature standoffish, an inveterate...

Magic Time!: ‘Actually’ by Theater J at Arena Stage

The vexing concept of consent in sex gets a seductively smart parsing in Anna Ziegler’s Actually. Now playing in an electrically well-acted Theater J production directed by Johanna Greunhut, Actually...

Review: ‘Little Shop of Horrors’ at the Kennedy Center

It has taken more than 35 years for Alan Menken and Howard Ashman’s iconic musical Little Shop of Horrors to reach the Kennedy Center. But it’s been worth the wait! The Kennedy Center’s Broadway...

A Conversation with Playwright Naomi Iizuka and Director Jon Jon Johnson

By Sophie Herreid, Caitlin Partridge, Lauren Patton I had so many hopes. I had so many dreams. But I died I died I died along the way. – Chorus of Refugees, ‘Anon[ymous]’ Playwright Naomi Iizuka...

Review: ‘The Fever’ at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company

Audience participation can so often be a painful and unwelcome component of a night at the theater, especially if, like myself, you’re prone to minor panic attacks at the thought of being randomly...

Review: ‘Illyria, or What You Will’ by Avant Bard

Illyria is fabulous, darlings. The clothes are to die for. The décor is out of its 1980s mind. The music is as eclectic as it is electric. And plot elements and characters drawn from Twelfth Night fit...

Review: ‘Actually’ by Theater J at Arena Stage

The idea of sexual consent might seem simple: no means stop and yes means carry on. In practice, however, nothing could be further from the truth. The predicaments stemming from this issue that so...

Five Questions for PUBLIQuartet

PUBLIQuartet is not a typical string quartet. Violinists Curtis Stewart and Jannina Norpoth, violist Nick Revel, and cellist Amanda Gookin make up this unique ensemble dedicated to improvising,...

Washington Stage Guild Founder Ann Norton Steps Down as Executive Director

The Washington Stage Guild announced the stepping-down of Executive Director Ann Norton, one of WSG’s Founding Members. Norton’s 32 years in leadership roles helped nurture the Washington Stage Guild...

Magic Time!: ‘The Fall’ at Studio Theatre

There is so much to be blown away by in The Fall, the powerful and thrilling performance piece devised and performed by seven South African students. Their majestic musicality, their propulsive...

From Stage to Screen: A Conversation with Four New York Actors Who Do Both

Among the many stage actors who have appeared on the big and small screen, New York-based Dan Domenech, Erik Ransom, Jamyl Dobson, and Johnny Smith are accomplished and well-versed in both. Though all...

Magic Time!: ‘How I Learned to Drive’ at Round House Theatre

I’ve been wary of this play since it was first produced in 1997. I remember hearing that it was about a pedophile and his niece and that its treatment of the uncle was sympathetic. So I didn’t trust...

Michael Bobbitt’s ‘Aida’ Mixes Grandeur and Intimacy at Constellation

Michael Bobbitt gets around. This master-of-all-trades, whose adaptation of Aida is now playing to sold-out audiences at Constellation Theatre, has danced, directed and choreographed his way around...

Jiehae Park’s ‘Peerless’ Reimagines ‘Macbeth’ at Shakespeare Theatre Company’s ReDiscovery Reading Series

There was a significant “first” at the Shakespeare Theatre Company (STC) 2018-19 ReDiscovery Reading Series at the Lansburgh Theatre this week. It was a reading of the enthralling, fearless Peerless,...

Review: ‘Henry V’ by Faction of Fools

A current exhibit at the Folger Shakespeare Library explores Winston Churchill’s admiration for Shakespeare, above all the World War II-era patriotic inspiration of Laurence Olivier’s film of Henry V....

Review: ‘The Babylon Line’ by The Colonial Players of Annapolis

Colonial Players’ production of The Babylon Line is an engaging drama that raises many questions about memory and writing. Written by Richard Greenberg and first performed in 2016, it focuses on a...

Happy Theater and sorrows&songs Present ‘AntiCone’

Happy Theater, a theatrical group using object puppetry and physical theatre to heal, unite and inspire, and sorrows&songs, peddling poetry and wonder by way of the stage, will bring the original...

2019 Capital Fringe Applications Now Open!

Applications are now open for the 2019 Capital Fringe Festival! See below for application details. OPTION 1: FRINGE RUN VENUE Participation in the Fringe Festival is an opportunity for you to develop...

Review: ‘Hairspray’ by Reston Community Players

Reston Community Players has built a reputation of presenting professional-quality theater that surpasses expectations of volunteer-based community theater, and their most recent production is no...

Review: ‘Blithe Spirit’ at Other Voices Theatre

This Halloween season, Other Voices Theatre is conjuring up a delightful evening of comedy in Noel Coward’s Blithe Spirit, brilliantly directed by Susan Thornton. Wishing to observe the behavior of...

Review: ‘Evil Dead: The Musical’ by Deer In The Spotlight Productions at Motor House

Evil Dead: The Musical is full of guts and gore and audience involvement, like Rocky Horror Show meets Little Shop Of Horrors meets Gallagher, as directed by Quentin Tarantino’s drunk half-brother. If...

Review: ‘Blight’ by Pinky Swear Productions at Anacostia Playhouse

A few years ago, the teenage son of a single mom shot up a Planned Parenthood clinic, and now the nice suburban home they lived in is a blight. The house not only brings the neighborhood down; it...

Review: ‘Figaro in Four Quartets’ by the In Series

From behind tall blank panels, a cast of characters drawn from Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro emerge, dressed in all white period garb, staging vignettes of frustrated and consummated love punctuated...

Magic Time!: ‘Chocolate Covered Ants’ by Restoration Stage at THEARC

When three hours in the theater elapse faster than many a 90-minute performance, it’s a good bet you’ve been in the thrall of a master storyteller. And that’s what happens in Chocolate Covered Ants,...

Review: ‘The Ferryman’ at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre

In ancient Greek mythology, Charon is the daemon who ferries the souls of the deceased to Hades across the river Styx, which divides the worlds of the living and the dead. In Jez Butterworth’s Olivier...

Review: ‘9 to 5: The Musical’ at Prince William Little Theatre

It can be hard sometimes for a musical adapted from a well-loved movie to meet expectations. Prince William Little Theater’s production of 9 to 5: The Musical was a fantastic and energy-filled...

Review: ‘The Book of Merman’ at St. Luke’s Theatre

The witty title gives a good indication of what to expect in the Off-Broadway engagement of The Book of Merman, now performing at St. Luke’s Theatre. A laugh-out-loud mash-up of Broadway’s smash hit...

Review: ‘Masters of the Italian Baroque’ by the National Chamber Ensemble

For those of us who are fans of the Baroque period, it’s no secret that the Counter Reformation served as one of the most fertile periods in European art history. With the advent of opera and the...

Review: ‘The Changeling’ by Brave Spirits Theatre

Sex, sin, retribution, and vengeance are only starting points for the simmering cauldron that is Brave Spirit’s amped production of The Changeling, a four centuries old Jacobean drama by Thomas...

Review: ‘Émilie, La Marquise Du Châtelet Defends Her Life Tonight’ by Vienna Theatre Company

Editing from the playwright’s own words, “Émilie is a play about legacy,” and “is a dilated moment in time just before Emilie’s death. It is a game of wit, a defiance of mortality, a beautiful battle...

Review: ‘Frankenstein’ by We Happy Few

A giant, wheezing monster, many feet tall and wide, a formless head towering over the audience, bathed in green light, with a voice made of dust and despair. That’s just one of the many fabulous...

Magic Time!: Actor Michael Kevin Darnall Opens Up About Being Open on Stage

When Michael Kevin Darnall plays a character who is the focus of a long scene and we can watch every nuance and shading of his emotional expression without interruption, he can be transfixing. When I...

Review: ‘Let the Right One In’ at Maryland Ensemble Theatre

Sweet innocence with a mature danger underneath – that is Let the Right One In at Maryland Ensemble Theatre (MET) in a phrase. If you are a fan of the horror and vampire genres, you have likely heard...

Review: ‘She Like Girls’ at University of Maryland, Baltimore County

Here’s a slick, snappy, lively show that’s timely, relevant and fun. It’s She Like Girls, and it’s got dance and music and diversity and authenticity. The best thing about this show is how the...

Choreographer Cathy Marston Talks Kennedy Center Debut With San Francisco Ballet

In San Francisco, the Unbound Festival included twelve choreographers and was a massive undertaking filled with phenomenal risks, tremendous creative freedom and the excitement of new territory. For...

Interview: San Francisco Ballet Artistic Director Helgi Tomasson Brings ‘Unbound’ to The Kennedy Center

In San Francisco, the Unbound Festival included 12 choreographers and was a massive undertaking filled with phenomenal risks, tremendous creative freedom and the excitement of new territory. For their...

Review: ‘Chocolate Covered Ants’ by Restoration Stage at THEARC

Hurt people hurt people: a cliché, yes, but one that helps understand many of the characters in Steven A. Butler, Jr.’s Chocolate Covered Ants, revived in Restoration Stage’s gorgeous new home in...

Halloween Best Bets for DC Theatre Lovers

Looking to have a spoooooky good

Review: ‘Gloria: A Life’ at the Daryl Roth Theatre

Award-winning writer, speaker, social activist, and feminist Gloria Steinem is the subject of Emily Mann’s new play Gloria: A Life, making its debut at the Daryl Roth Theatre. Directed by Diane...

Senator Chris Van Hollen Cuts Ribbon to Re-open Adventure Theatre MTC After Devastating Fire

Adventure Theatre MTC announced its grand reopening on October 15th in Glen Echo Park after 7 months of renovations due to an electrical fire. Senator Chris Van Hollen joined executives from Adventure...

In the Moment: ‘How I Learned to Drive’ at Round House Theatre

The latest data from the Child Welfare League of America indicate that in Maryland in 2015, there were over 51,000 referrals for child abuse and neglect. Of those, nearly 21,000 reports were referred...

Review: ‘Steel Magnolias’ by L.A. Theatre Works at George Mason University Center for the Arts

Robert Harling’s Steel Magnolias is a heartbreaking story that exemplifies the female bond and illustrates the resilient strength that bolsters six women from a small southern town through times of...

Is ‘Beetlejuice’ a ‘Perfect’ Musical?

Beetlejuice opens at the National Theatre this month, featuring the work of a tightknit team of American theater professionals – and one Australian that none of them had ever heard of. The show’s...

Review: ‘Rooms: A Rock Romance’ at MetroStage

By Danny Romeo MetroStage is getting the band back together. Rooms: A Rock Romance celebrates the ten-year anniversary of its premiere this year, in the very theatre where the production had its...

Review: ‘Aida’ by Constellation Theatre Company at Source

Just before intermission in Constellation Theatre Company’s sparkling and stirring production of Aida, there comes a wonderful “Wakanda Forever” moment. The fearless Nubian princess Aida (a...

Review: ‘How I Learned to Drive’ at Round House Theatre

Twenty years ago, Paula Vogel’s How I Learned to Drive shocked audiences with its holistic examination of pedophilia. It takes a village to molest a child, Vogel believes, not just a perpetrator and a...

Review: ‘The Fall’ at Studio Theatre

A passionate purity burns bright in The Fall. The incandescence of young people with hearts on fire contending against oppressive institutions burns bright in the 2015 South Africa portrayed in The...

Local Lute Player Ronn McFarlane Brings Medieval Instrument to Modern Audiences

When asked to picture a lute, the average 21st-century music fan might envision an illustration from a medieval illuminated manuscript, depicting someone in tights, maybe some sort of tunic and floppy...

Review: ‘Dirty Pictures’ at Rapid Lemon Productions

Closing its 2018 season with a World Premiere by a Local Author, Rapid Lemon debuts Dirty Pictures at Theatre Project. Pucker up: it’s about sex and love and ambition and alcoholism and bad choices...

Rick Foucheux Returns to Quotidian: Retired Acting Legend Presents Backstage Comedy at Fundraiser

When Rick Foucheux, the award-winning actor whose work has dazzled DC audiences for 35 years, decided to retire last year, it wasn’t because he was tired of the stage. He just wanted to focus on other...