With the Audience Choice Awards nominations being announced soon, it is a good time to consider and honor my favorite contemporary plays which debuted in the Washington area during the 2010-2011 season just ended. While I enjoy fine productions of Shakespeare, Edward Albee, Tennessee Williams and the other great playwrights, new works are important for […]
Archives for August 2011
STC’s Free Julius Caesar opens this week
This year’s Shakespeare Theatre’s popular Free For All is the return of their 2008 production of Julius Caesar. Originally directed by David Muse, now Artistic Director of Studio Theatre, this production will be restaged by David Paul, who was the plays’ assistant director in 2008.
Guys and Dolls
DC area fans of Broadway’s golden age musicals have had a heck of a 2010-2011 season. Arena Stage re-launched itself last fall with a mega-boffo new production of Oklahoma!. (It’s back this month for a reprise.) The Kennedy Center presented a fine traveling production of South Pacific last Christmas. And now, Wolf Trap is hosting […]
Constellation’s Ramayana becomes the next summer rerun to sell out
August is the hottest month for ticket sales too. DC audiences are showing they like seeing their favorite shows the second time around. Yesterday morning, Constellation Theatre had only 30 seats left for its return run of The Ramayana at Source. They’re gone now, guaranteeing busy nights for the 14th Street venue through August 21st. Woolly […]
Which shows are you sorry you missed this year?
Our annual Audience Choice Awards recognizes the best productions and performances of the 2010/11 DC area theatrical season. Our staff is busy compiling their nominations, and soon we will turn it over to you to vote for your favorites. On Monday, August 15th, we’ll begin with a mini-series looking back on some of the season’s […]
Big Deal for Adventure Theatre
World premiere youth version of Big, The Musical – Natascia Diaz joins DC cast Five or so years ago, when Adventure Theatre was an undersized children’s theater with a tiny budget and less-than-stellar artistic capabilities, someone must have gone to the carnival and found the “Zoltar Speaks” machine. “I want Adventure to be BIG!” he must […]
Washington Shakespeare is Dead. Long Live WSC Avant Bard
“What’s in a name?” the Bard of Avon once asked. “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” Perhaps. But it wouldn’t be as well described, and so after twenty-one years as The Washington Shakespeare Company, the Rosslyn-based troupe has renamed itself “WSC Avant Bard”.
The Ramayana
Monkey butt jokes, Bollywood-style dance sequences, parables about how to be the ideal husband and wife, delectable world music and actors who make virtue and duty seem kinda sexy intermingle in Constellation Theatre Company’s remounting of last season’s hit The Ramayana.
The Nervous Set – Original Broadway Cast Recording
DC Theatre Scene Editor Lorraine Treanor’s touching tribute to Fran Landesman, who died last month, provides the impetus for this week’s Theatre Shelf column.
Uncle Vanya
After a particularly unfortunate week, what a pleasure it was to wallow in the misery of others. Especially when that misery was as lustrous as that portrayed by the Sydney Theatre Company in their startling production of Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya.
Report from Glimmerglass: opera beside the lake
Since its inception in 1975, the Glimmerglass Festival has grown from a small summer stock opera in rented digs in a local high school auditorium to a state-of-the-art theatre on beautiful Lake Otsego in New York’s Cooperstown.
Olney Theatre presents its free outdoor Taming of the Shrew
The Olney Theatre Center, Olney’s 73-year-old professional, award-winning Equity theater, is ending August on a wild note. On August 26 and 27, they’ll celebrate their 22nd annual Shakespeare Theatre Festival with the National Player’s production of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew. The festival is free of charge, and will be held at Olney Theatre Center’s […]