It all started with the voice. As a child, Randy Johnson listened intently to a recording of George and Ira Gershwin’s “Summertime.” Little Randy was not listening to an opera album or a cast recording of Porgy and Bess. “At age five, I listened to Janis Joplin’s recording of ‘Summertime’ over and over again.”
Archives for September 2012
A Couple of Blaguards
The Keegan Theatre’s A Couple of Blaguards is an oasis of madcap, guilt-free fun in the midst of a DC fall season that usually emphasizes high-seriousness or more substantial fare. The Keegan’s revival of this oddball piece, penned by the Irish brothers McCourt as a comic entertainment in the early 1990s, became a hit in […]
Michael Kahn named to Theater Hall of Fame
Michael Kahn, the 25-plus-year Artistic Director of Washington’s Shakespeare Theatre Company, has been named to the Theater Hall of Fame, the American Theater Critics Association announced today.
Alex Mills, star of Synetic’s Jekyll and Hyde
In Synetic Theater’s newest production, based on Robert Louis Stevenson’s short novel, Alex Mills plays both the muted Professor Jekyll and his voracious alter ego Mister Hyde. Under guidance from Mills, and in the company’s uniquely acrobatic style, the audience experiences a well-known story from some dark, surprising new angles. We spoke with Mills about […]
J.B.
The American Century Theater’s new production of Archibald MacLeish’s nearly forgotten verse play J.B. is well worth encountering, particularly if you’re looking for an intellectual challenge. ACT’s take on this unusual play re-creates its meticulously crafted, highly emotional yet surprisingly probing look back to a post-war era when Americans had begun to seriously question the […]
How a Carol Channing doll led to Holly Down in Heaven
Forum Theatre’s next undertaking is the ambitious world premiere of Holly Down in Heaven. The tale of young Holly, a brilliant fifteen-year-old born again Christian, who becomes pregnant and confides in her dolls, may not sound like a hilarious and poignant comedy, so check your baggage at the door.
Big, the musical at Adventure Theatre/MTC
The long awaited world premiere production of Big has finally hit the stage and is definitely worth the wait. This first fully staged collaboration between Adventure Theatre and the Musical Theatre Center (MTC) combines the strength of a powerhouse production company with a young people’s artistic and educational training program with remarkable results. And believe […]
Party like it’s 1599 with Shakespeare Theatre costumes
I understand your dilemma: you’re about to make an appearance before traffic court, and you have nothing to wear. It’s your third time up in the last six months, and this time it might be your license. So you need to garb yourself with something that screams imperious, and yet approachable on a good night.
The Government Inspector
All right, let’s start with this. The Government Inspector is a five-alarm fire of a play, a bell-ringing, jitterbugging dance through a swamp of hypocrisy which is both ancient and modern. It is better than five stars; in The Government Inspector everyone’s a star, in his own sick, mendacious way.
Three – Count E’m Three – from Encores!
Not in this century have we musical theater lovers been so lucky as to have all three of the scores of the season’s series of Encores! concerts at New York’s City Center recorded for our listening pleasure and collecting treasure. This is no small thing, for whenever an Encores! presentation is preserved on CD, it […]
Mother, May I
You know a dysfunctional family drama is working when you think to yourself “My family is crackers, but they are nothing compared to this brood.” That’s what happens during the second act of Mother, May I, the world premiere production of Dylan Brody’s dramedy presented with neurotic panache by director Rain Pryor at Baltimore’s Strand […]
Black Watch
Playwright Gregory Burke’s intense and electrifying Black Watch manages to capture the valorous romance, raw humanity and transcendent camaraderie of soldiers in combat while simultaneously searing the experience with the tragic, brutal truths borne of war.