Dec 22nd, 1989 was the end of a world in Romania. Everything its people had endured for two generations or more – privations which caused them to wait hours in line for a half-dozen eggs or a loaf of bread; a security apparatus so far-reaching that by one estimate one in every four Romanians was […]
Archives for September 2011
With Baltimore Connections, a New York address, and Moscow Art Theater training, Studio Six Theatre puts the Alpha back into Acting
This column is about Baltimore theater, and, admittedly, the connection between Studio Six (in New York City) and Baltimore is a little tenuous.
AU student production carries out Troy Davis’ last wish
Rick Hammerly talks about how directing Dead Man Walking has changed him as an artist On Wednesday night, Sept 21st, as supporters of Troy Davis held a vigil outside the Georgia prison where the prisoner faced execution after 22 years on Death Row, and millions more followed media coverage worldwide, director Rick Hammerly and the […]
Love Cures Cancer: A Musical
Some of you have lost loved ones to a disease that took its sweet time to do its destruction. I will not ask you to remember what that felt like. You recalled it all, just because I brought it up. For the rest: if you need a metaphor, hold your breath while suffering an eye […]
Europe, kids-style, comes to Washington
Does this sound a little – what’s the word? – twee? A festival of European theater for the 2 to 12 set. October 14 – November 10, 2011
Sweet Tea: Black Gay Men of the South
A boy finds himself in a strange new garden on that day when, suddenly, his sexuality starts to blossom. The assumptions he’s made about who he is — and the assumptions that others have made about him — can crack and crumble. Like a lot of growing up, it can hurt. So the man he […]
Ay, Carmela!
From the get-go, it’s do or die. Mona Martínez, as Carmela, and Diego Mariani, as Paulino, are as skittish as if dancing in front of a firing squad. Thanks to these two breathtaking theatre artists, ìAy, Carmela!, based on a real life love story, is both funny and profoundly moving on a deeply human level. […]
cut him out in little stars: a candlelight tribute to Gaurav Gopalan
A candlelight vigil will be held Sunday, Sept 25th, from 7 to 10pm beginning at the Dupont Circle fountain and walking to the 2600 block of 11th Street NW, Washington, DC. Actors Jason McCool, Heather Haney and Jay Hardee are organizing a candlelight vigil to remember beloved theatremaker Gaurav Gopalan. Everyone is welcome to participate. […]
DC Medical Examiner reverses preliminary autopsy; calls Gopalan death a homicide
Police ask for the community’s assistance It is with great sadness that we report that the death of Gaurav Gopalan, an aerospace engineer who doubled as a director, dramaturge and production manager, has been ruled a homicide. A passerby found the thirty-five-year-old artist and scientist unconscious on a street near his Columbia Heights home on […]
Fela! director Bill T. Jones
Kuti’s Afrobeat was just the background to his workouts until 30 years later when he brought the musician’s story to Broadway Consider Fela Ankulapo Kuti. In his fifty-nine years on the planet, he invented a new form of music – Afrobeat; recorded seventy albums; challenged – socially and politically – the society in which he […]
Macbeth
Why Shakespeare without words? And can it be done well? People are still asking that. But Synetic Theater, now in its tenth season, with no less than seven of its signature wordless Shakespeare plays now under its belt, is presenting three of its past productions in what the company is calling The Silent Shakespeare Theatre […]
Sweet Bye and Bye
Will the well of wonders unearthed in Secaucus in 1986 ever run dry? Here, 25 years later, we have a brand new “World Premiere Recording” of the score of a 1946 musical! Who knows what gems remain to emerge?