A play about gun control, mental health, Robert Kennedy, and the Umpqua Community College shooting that forms a cohesive message without hitting the audience over the head with an anvil? It’s real, it’s bold, and it’s here in D.C. thanks to playwright-director Ginger Dayle and New City Stage Company.
5 Epiphanies (Capital Fringe review)
Full disclosure: I have spent most of the last decade as a teacher, immersed in the world of autobiographical storytellin . I work with my students to become less “literary” and more “conversational”. I teach them not to use notes so that they can converse and connect better with the audience. I ask them to stand, […]
SHINKA (Capital Fringe review)
The post World War II Japanese dance theatre form, Butoh, is traditionally performed in white body make-up. Slow controlled movement, body tension and muscular involvement may rely on elaborate visualizations, a certain state of mind or feeling, visceral cues or spiritual content. Shinka, directed by Yoshiko Usami and presented by RenGyoSoh assumes the framework of Butoh […]
A Capital Fringe pub crawl of H Street bars
We sent Marshall Bradshaw out to check on what bars near Fringe headquarters have the most to offer all you Fringe-goers. Star & Shamrock Tavern & Deli 1341 H St NE 10% Off with your Fringe button Right next to the Atlas Theater, Star & Shamrock is an H St classic, setting the bar for […]
Repentance (Capital Fringe review)
A light night of theater Repentance is not. In one uninterrupted dialogue that unfolds over the course of 90 minutes, Repentance tells a story of mental anguish, power games and abuse. Nicole Hertvik reviews for DC Metro Theater Arts
“It’s What We Do”: A Play about the Occupation (Capital Fringe review)
Nazi Germany, South African apartheid, any city USA circa Black Lives Matter, pre-civil rights era America, Batista regime in Cuba, Cochabamba in Bolivia, Syrian uprising, 1984, even Jews in Bethlehem during the time of Jesus. All these geopolitical comparisons and more can be made during this one play.
The Heroes’ Tale (Capital Fringe review)
Four black men in their forties sit around a chess game in Dupont Circle park in 1980. They open the show singing barbershop-quartet style, an upbeat song about themselves: They are the 1342 Dupont Circle Heroes. (“White folks pretended we didn’t exist so we started calling ourselves Heroes.”) They’ve been friends for more than 20 […]
Kara Sevda (Capital Fringe review)
Let’s get this part out of the way quickly: Lisa VillaMil’s Kara Sevda (at Shopkeepers through July 22) is an exhilarating piece of theater, masterfully and assuredly directed by Kat Haan, beautifully acted by Tierney Nolen and William Foote, thoroughly realized in this Now What Theatre production, and you should see it. It is the best thing […]
Arden Now (Capital Fringe review)
“My employer is an asshole.” Shakespeare said that. Ok, not exactly. But the Rude Mechanicals somehow fit the line seamlessly into Arden Now, their abbreviated and modified – yet still spoken in verse – version of As You Like It. Nicole Hertvik reviews for DC Metro Theater Arts
’round Fringe: two sleuths crack the case of cheesy pizza
KOENIGSBERG – It started off a day just like any other. My colleague and I had just finished a performance of our play I’m Margaret Thatcher, I Is! at Atlas’s Lab II venue (plug plug plug). After a long day on the job, we decided to stop by H &Pizza, like so many times before. […]
Daggers MacKenzie (Capital Fringe review)
There are surprisingly few one-actor musicals. Even rarer: solo musicals where the protagonist juggles razor-sharp daggers. Make your one-actor, dagger-juggling musical about a lesbian circus performer in the days of the Wild West and you have — Daggers MacKenzie.
ClickB@it (Capital Fringe review)
Internet addiction is no laughing matter. However, for the talented team now lighting up the stage at the Sprenger Theatre at Atlas, the Internet–and all the craziness it has produced–is the stuff of which jokes are made. Ravelle Brickman reviews for DC Metro Theater Arts