Somewhere along the way, Landless became the “South Park” of the DC theatre network. Their shows are practically made of construction paper, and each one is pumped full of cute, filthy-minded satire and sing-along idiocy. Once again, that impish spirit proves an asset, especially when the story’s main characters are as juvenile as the writers’ sense of humor. [Read more...]

“It is only too true that a lot of artists are mentally ill – it’s a life which, to put it mildly, makes one an outsider,” Vincent van Gogh once observed. “I’m all right when I completely immerse myself in work, but I’ll always remain half crazy.” [Read more...]

“Marriage is a very risky thing; it’s like Chancery, once in it, you can’t get out of it, and the costs are enormous,” bemoans Cheviot Hill at the thought of his potential engagement to three different women at the same time in W.S. Gilbert’s three-act farcical comic play, Engaged.  This witty play, presented by the Victorian Lyric Opera Company at the Mountain at Mt. Vernon Place United Methodist Church, is engaging and highly enjoyable. [Read more...]

I was really looking forward to seeing The Von Pufferhutte Family Singers (the musical) because I really enjoyed the same company’s (I Like Nuts) production of Captain Squishy’s Yee Haw Jamboree last year. I’m sorry to say that this musical about a German family troupe who despise their competitors – the famous Van Trapp Family Singers (from The Sound of Music) because they stole the song “Edelweiss” from them – bit off a “liesl” too much, and frankly “es war nicht zu gut!” [Read more...]

With a title like Chlamydia dell’Arte: A Sex-Ed Burlesque, I just couldn’t resist. The name alone represents all things Fringe! Risky titillation rubbing up against camp with a classy wink? I’m in. Not to mention the added benefit of watching people’s faces twist up in disgust as the title rolled off my tongue like the first line of Lolita. [Read more...]

This is what the Fringe is all about! Give Brian Sutow and Joshua Morgan  (of No Rules Theatre Company) some credit. They are adorable and nuts and they are just having a blast performing their show Assembly Required: How to Write, Produce, and Stage a Musical – The Musical. They have so much energy that sometimes you wonder what “they’re on”. [Read more...]

Commedia dell’arte, that venerable Italian theater form populated by masked stock characters and vaudevillian slapstick, makes for an interesting departure from conventional theater-going.  The energy is quick, light, and informal.  The actors roll with punches, figurative and literal.  The audience is allowed—encouraged, really—to be a character unto itself. [Read more...]

When the traditional roles of performers and audience members are challenged, the balance of power shifts, but then who has the upper hand? In Elephant, a performance art piece choreographed by Kelly Bond and danced by Bond, Lillian Cho, and Melissa Krodman, the performers break the fourth wall of the stage, in this case The Apothecary, and challenge the audience for their space. [Read more...]