The boys are on Broadway, and they are fabulous. Jim Parsons, Zachary Quinto, Matt Bomer and the rest of the nine-member cast of The Boys in the Band look like they are enjoying themselves as they trade quips and kisses; eat cake and unwrap birthday gifts; and dance the Madison to 1960’s R&B music. Fifty years […]
Archives for May 2018
Review: Shakespeare Theatre Company’s Camelot crosses over to the dark side
The mythical city of Camelot has always been little more than a dream – a forest kingdom of unsurpassed beauty where magicians and enchantresses gleefully meddle in human affairs, knights battle dragons and other fantastical beasts, and maidens swoon accordingly. And ruling over it all, King Arthur and his loyal knights of the round table, […]
Christopher Henley, Prospero in The Tempest, talks of WSC Avant Bard’s dramatic history with Shakespeare’s comedy
As William Shakespeare’s only comedy set in the new world, The Tempest deals with a major act of betrayal, ill treatment, the development of magic arts and a revenge plot that other playwrights would spin into tragedies. It’s a popular play and one that WSC Avant Bard will take on for the third time, 25 […]
Review: Final thoughts on 2018 Spoleto Festival. Strong women, fake news and favorite performance
Some of the best of Spoleto comes happenstance and often spills out onto the streets. So don’t let the size of your wallet dictate whether you can take part in the joyful exuberance of the Spoleto Festival, which runs through June 10, 2018. There are plenty of free or mostly free concerts, including jazz and […]
Review: Charlotte’s Web casts its spell at Creative Cauldron
Charlotte’s Web, the beloved children’s book by E.B. White, is an emotionally taut tale that plays well with music by Charles Strause, who’s next musical was Annie. Here, Creative Cauldron has brought it lovingly to life by children, for children, with the same warmth and spirit that has had generations cheering for a runty piglet […]
Review: Ballet Nacional de Cuba performing Don Quixote
It was 40 years ago that the Ballet Nacional de Cuba made its U.S. debut at the Kennedy Center and 30 years ago that it premiered its production of Don Quixote. It was 70 years ago that Alicia Alonso founded the company bearing her name that would become the Ballet Nacional after the 1959 revolution. […]
Review: Bad Jews – an entertaining fastball of a comedy
Family members are complicated. They can comfort during tearful times and lunge at the flick of a few cruel words. NextStop Theatre Company’s Bad Jews is a powder keg of familial tension that’s packed into ninety, explosively funny minutes.
Dria Brown plays Joan of Arc. How being a woman of color affects Bedlam’s Saint Joan
Bedlam Theatre Company of New York City once again returns to DC, bringing their acclaimed, stripped-down production of George Bernard Shaw’s Saint Joan at Folger Theatre. Audiences might remember when they brought their repertory productions of Hamlet and Saint Joan to Olney Theatre Center in 2013, and Bedlam Artistic Director Eric Tucker, directed his adaptation […]
2018 Spoleto Festival USA – Miami City Ballet is sublime and a diva dies twice
To judge the relative importance of a performing arts festival, one must ask the questions: “How are the arts furthered?” and “How are the artists being pushed?” Challenges come in all shapes and sizes. Though “classic” in form, the Miami City Ballet is a relatively young company that boasts some terrific soloists from America’s two […]
From Charleston, SC, opening day for 2018 Spoleto Festival USA
Charleston ravishes the senses. The unique aromas of this town hit you on your first step onto its streets. Confederate jasmine and magnolia mix with the smell of salty pluff mud at low tide. That in turn folds in the smell of carriage horses tirelessly transporting tourists up and down its historical corridors. If it’s […]
We Happy Few’s Pericles is a wild ride
One block west of the main drag through Eastern Market, in the cozy Capitol Hill Arts Workshop, the aptly named troupe We Happy Few has an amusing, engaging winner of a show with their take on Shakespeare’s underappreciated action adventure comedy Pericles, Prince of Tyre.
How playwright Bob Bartlett’s personal story became part of Swimming with Whales
D.C. Playwright Bob Bartlett has always been curious about the ways humans respond to injured or distressed animals, and that theme seems to find its way into his writing again and again.