Nothing succeeds like excess, Oscar Wilde once wrote, and nowhere is that more true than in America. We are the land that invented competitive eating; when the Olympics finally welcomed professional athletes we sent the Dream Team; and we have a world-class opioid epidemic.
Review: Tom Teasely underscoring The Cabinet of Dr Caligari closes this weekend
Looking for something a little… weird? Have I got a show for you. A Zombie. A Mad Doctor. A Carnival. An Insane Asylum. Live Music. Yes, a garden of delights awaits you, courtesy of Constellation Theatre. Start with the 1920 German Expressionist silent film masterpiece Das Kabinet des Dr Caligari, and add the offbeat music […]
Constellation Theatre reprises Mary Zimmerman’s Arabian Nights ten years later (review)
The Arabian Nights is perhaps the quintessential Constellation Theatre show, and therefore ideal for them to revisit ten years after they first presented it, as part of their anniversary season. Directed by founder Allison Arkell Stockman, it would serve well as an introduction to the popular company for unfamiliar Washingtonians, and also offers a chance […]
Constellation’s Peter and the Starcatcher takes dazzling flight at Source (review)
Think of your favorite pop-up book as a kid: the bright colors, the interactive story, the giddy surprise of action leaping off the page. This feeling of childlike wonder drives Constellation Theatre Company’s ingenious production of Rick Elice’s Peter and the Starcatcher, a Peter Pan origin story bursting with full-throated song, high flying choreography, and […]
Bryer puts her hooks in Constellation’s Peter and the Starcatcher
When director Kathryn Chase Bryer saw Peter and the Starcatcher on Broadway five years ago, she was blown away by how it created stage images in such a minimalistic way. Now her version, in which she is able to extend the Broadway version in an intimate venue, opens at Constellation Theatre this weekend.
Most memorable moments on DC area stages in 2016
As this year closes, perhaps you, like we, are thinking back over your own year spent watching the various riches spread before us by Washington area theatres. I asked our staff for their most vivid memories. We hope you will share your own as comments for us all to savor.
Fritz Lang’s silent movie Metropolis gets new Tom Teasley percussive score (review)
In Constellation Theatre Company’s screeningof Metropolis, Tom Teasley’s live music breathes new life into the 89-year-old classic. Every production in Constellation’s 10th season will feature live music, but this production takes that idea and runs with it. A Constellation collaborator since The Arabian Nights in their first season, Tom Teasley provides a live and partially […]
Allison Stockman on directing Constellation’s Urinetown
When Urinetown first played the New York Fringe Festival in 2001, it became one of the most buzz-worthy musicals to hit the Big Apple in years. With an outrageous original story by Greg Kottis and music by Mark Hollmann, the story details a city in the midst of a dire water shortage and an all-powerful […]
Urinetown: The Musical from Constellation Theatre (review)
It takes a lot of balls but maybe not much brain to call a musical “Urinetown,” and the joke is made several times in the show just what a terrible name it is. But that’s the point. This constantly self-referential musical makes fun of the very form while ever stuffing the show with familiar boondoggle […]
My won’t-miss shows for this season
If you’re like me, you’ve already done your Christmas shopping, filled out your budget for the next fiscal year, and made arrangements for your final repose after The Event Which Awaits Us All occurs. Now it’s time for something much more difficult: planning your theater season.
Journey to the West from Constellation Theatre (review)
April turns out to be an “epic” month in the city. This week Washington National Opera opens its much-anticipated full “Ring Cycle” by Richard Wagner, and Constellation Theatre, the company that sails into the theater awards ceremony with more Helen Hayes nominations than any other company this year, has just debuted its production of Mary […]
Constellation’s 10th anniversary season: three plays and a movie
Constellation Theatre Company will celebrate its tenth anniversary season with a wildly successful contemporary musical, a children’s story set on stage and Mary Zimmerman’s reanimation of a classic tale, the Company announced Friday. It will further leaven the season with a four-day showing of the classic Fritz Lang silent film, Metropolis, backed by original music […]