Rapunzel, starring Felicia Curry as the feisty teenage heroine, has earned an extra week at Imagination Stage, and will now close May 26th. Jayne Blanchard described the musical, written by the two creators of the Emmy Award-winning television show “Friends”, as ” replete with light, tuneful ditties with witty lyrics that remind you of Into the […]
Archives for April 2012
It’s A Grand Night for Singing indeed with Washington Savoyard’s production
If you’re among the many, many Washingtonians who love good vocal and choral music, you can’t do better than to head on down to the Atlas Performing Arts Center to catch the Washington Savoyards’ great current offering, A Grand Night for Singing.
The Columnist
I was certainly alive during the reign of Joseph Alsop as a syndicated political columnist, but the truth is he and his writings never attracted me, so I approached David Auburn’s play The Columnist with little background information and no particular interest.
Everyman’s next season includes the opening of their new downtown theatre
Baltimore’s Everyman Theatre has announced a 2012-2013 season which will close down its 1727 North Charles Street venue with the memory of war, and then inaugurate its tenure at its new downtown Inner Harbor location on 315 West Fayette Street with a series of domestic dramas and comedies, full of strategy and explosiveness.
Dancing at Lughnasa
When faced with the choice between the safety of a familiar life and the potential of an unwritten future, which would you choose? In Quotidian Theatre’s poignant production of Brian Friel’s Dancing at Lughnasa, five sisters maintain a comfortable yet monotonous routine in a small shared house, until male interlopers, implacable economic forces, and their […]
YPT’s New Play Festival: young playwrights turn life into plays
Over the past seventeen years, the Young Playwrights’ Theater has reached over 8,000 elementary, middle and high school students throughout the greater D.C. area with free, in-depth playwriting and literacy workshops. During that time they have professionally produced 240 plays and performed for more than 83,000 people while employing over 600 area theatre artists.
The Whipping Man at Theater J
There’s a reason why The Whipping Man is becoming one of the most produced plays around — its premise of a Passover Seder among newly freed slaves raised as Jews is mind-blowing, and with the right casting and directing, the play spins old concepts in stunningly creative new ways. The production at Theater J hits […]
The Best Man
The interior of the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre on Broadway is decorated to the nines with bunting, campaign photos; hoopla music is playing over the speakers; the management wants you to know from the get go that you will be attending the July 1960 Presidential convention in Philadelphia, and will be having a look at all […]
The 28th Helen Hayes Awards, a night of surprises
From out front – The Awards show (filed by Debbie Jackson) The theme that seemed to permeate the Helen Hayes Awards Ceremony this year was gentle kindness and appreciation for the arts and one’s fellow artists. Acceptance speeches were more humble and gracious than usual, no rants, no tirades, or loud explosive bits. “Just, wow—I […]
God of Carnage
God of Carnage feels like a Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf for the 21st century. The characters are better dressed, finer housed, super toned, and a whole lot funnier. But playwright Yasmina Reza argues that the same god still reigns, and that under the surface we are still primitives. Scratch us and we don’t bleed, […]
Phantom of the Opera 25th Anniversary Concert Staging
The 25 Anniversary of what is now the longest running musical in Broadway history was celebrated last October with not just a concert, but a full staging of the entire show in London’s massive Royal Albert Hall with its seating of over 5,000. It was captured on audio and video discs, each or either of […]
Postcard from Morocco and Miss Havisham’s Fire
A comprehensive and stunning celebration of composer Dominick Argento’s work is being presented at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, and it simply should not be missed.