The Capital Fringe Festival, DC’s annual theatrical adventure into the new, the innovative, the small, and the off-the-wall, is now open to the ticket-buying public. Here’s what you need to know: WHEN IS IT? Fringe runs from July 7 to 29. That last week will reprise favorite Fringe shows. WHAT’S THE LINEUP? Show descriptions and […]
Archives for June 2018
Review: Why Hamilton is the greatest musical yet written
The singular genius of Hamilton, the greatest musical ever written, is that it recognizes that the American Revolution did not end with Yorktown, but is ongoing, even today, and that there are Founders of America being born even as we speak.
Rainbow Theatre Project presents 5 shows in Season 6
The Rainbow Theatre Project, dedicated to producing art which captures the experience of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, will present a five-production sixth season which includes a cabaret and a work from one of America’s greatest playwrights. The season will begin with Siegmund Fuchs’ In the Closet, a story about four gay men, each […]
The Tempest is a Bad Play. WSC Avant Bard has made it better.
In The Tempest, the lordly Prospero, formerly known as the Duke of Milan, is marooned on a miserable island with his daughter as his only human company. He also has Caliban, a growling subhuman whose function it is, apparently, to gather firewood, and the sprite Ariel, who he inherited from the island’s former occupant — […]
Review: The Legend of Georgia McBride, a drag-to-riches comedy
Break out the Bedazzler and falsies and shimmy into your Spanx. It’s high season for drag in downtown Bethesda, thanks to the fierce and funny The Legend of Georgia McBride, playwright Matthew Lopez’s mash note to queens, all gussied up with sequins, sentiment and spectacle.
1st Stage announces its 11th Season, 5 plays and a festival
For its 11th season, Tyson’s 1st Stage will have a war story, a story about the aftermath of a war, a story about a tragic war fought in a high school, a story about a man returning from prison life — and a story about a wedding. Plus: a festival of solo performances.
Dance Review: Step Afrika!’s Soul-Stirring ‘Migration’
The painter Jacob Lawrence’s 60-panel Migration Series chronicles the exodus of more than six million African-Americans from the South to the North starting around 1916. The WPA-funded project was published in 1941 when he was 25. Step Afrika!, D.C.’s home-grown step dance company, takes spirited inspiration from these works in The Migration: Reflections on Jacob […]
Review: Dancing in My Cockroach Killers
It’s a funny title, isn’t it? Dancing in My Cockroach Killers. Yet, profoundly telling. About stereotypes. About other cultures. About “our” opinions of Latinos. Yet, this is not a show about Latin ethnicity generally, but rather a specific celebration of Puerto Rico and its rich culture, musical heritage, and ability to survive an oppressor that […]
Review: Ever in the Glades, a TYA from deep in the Everglades
When thinking of Theatre for Young Audiences (TYA), we’d be forgiven for thinking of beloved children’s fables, or charming musicals with lessons to be learned. Oftentimes the messages are given to us in neat little packages tied up with heartfelt bows.
Until – a look at recent #MeToo moments in Boston theatre and elsewhere
The Boston theatre community was rocked to its core this spring following a Facebook posting by a 26-year old actor. In this post, the young man recounts in vivid and unsettling detail how, as a 20-year old college theatre major in 2012, he was on a late night bus back from a theatre trip to […]
Loesser’s How to Succeed in Business gets a modern update
Director Marc Bruni knew he was taking a risk in revamping the classic Frank Loesser (music and lyrics) musical How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying for a modern Washington, D.C. audience. Sure, the nearly sixty-year old musical comedy has a pedigree that precedes it—the original Broadway run took home seven Tony Awards.
Maggie Dransfield gets her big break at Toby’s as Mamma Mia! star
Thanks to a 14-year run on Broadway and an even longer 19-year run in London’s West End—which continues to this day—Mamma Mia! is one of the most beloved jukebox musicals ever. It’s no wonder that Toby’s Dinner Theatre has chosen the musical as its summer show, staging its high-energy production June 15 to Sept. 9 […]