I Take Your hand in Mine is based on the intimate letters written between Anton Chekhov at the end of his life and his wife Olga Knipper. It has come to the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop in the busiest holiday season and for the briefest of runs, but don’t lose the opportunity to see this […]
Review: Taffety Punk Riot Grrrls perform Othello
How do you like your Shakespeare? Intimate. Intelligent. Intrepid. And, I’d also add fully integrated through emotional truth and delivery of the musical richness of Shakespeare’s language. Taffety Punk has made just about all of that happen with the return of its all female “band,” Riot Grrrls, starring in William Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Othello, […]
Review: Skip the long rehearsals. Taffety Punk actors jump right into the action with Richard III
The best theater reveals moments of high emotion built on the intersection of intense preparation and the chaos of live performance. By that measure, the best theater experience in DC is Taffety Punk’s Bootleg Shakespeare. This year, the Punks took on Richard III, and unequivocally showed their mastery of Shakespeare’s historical masterpiece. Here’s how the […]
Mom Baby Gone, the tragicomedy of a pro-life teen (review)
During my formative years in the suburban south, it seemed that the word “pro-life” extended beyond political headlines and chants: it was ingrained in the teen culture. Friends invited me to youth lock-ins that emphasized anti-abortion ideals, and sex-ed centered on the view that abstinence was my only option. I remember a fellow student walking […]
She Rode Horses Like the Stock Exchange review
Rectangles of Astroturf. A leafless blue tree branch, a standing lamp. Four very, very good actors and a script by playwright Amelia Roper. That’s all Taffety Punk Theatre needs to show us The American Dream in ashes.
Riot Grrrls’ Trojan Women: in defeat, transcendence (review)
History, they say, is written by the victors, which may be one reason why Euripides’s The Trojan Women is such a striking piece. By focusing on the women of Troy in the time between the fall of the city and their being taken away to a life of slavery on Greek ships, a different side […]
An Iliad from Taffety Punk (review)
How much can a single great performance carry a whole production? That question is put to the test in Taffety Punk’s staging of Lisa Peterson and Denis O’Hare’s An Iliad, a semi-contemporized take on Homer’s classic tale of the Trojan War featuring a remarkable star turn from Esther Williamson. But frustrating staging and design choices […]
Rosalind Lacy’s Top 12 shows of 2015
Hispanic theatre bonds me to my family heritage. I was born in Los Angeles, California, with Latino roots that date back to Spain through the American southwest. I grew up in a decade on the brink of the Civil Rights movement in America. It was a time when it wasn’t cool to be Spanish or […]
UpClose: Liz Maestri, Women’s Voices Theater Festival
Inheritance Canyon, Liz Maestri’s new play, debuts September 18, 2015, produced by Taffety Punk.
Enter Ophelia, distracted
“Full of sound and fury, signifying [a crazy night of theater]”. That’s the quick summary of Taffety Punk Theatre Company’s world premiere of Enter Ophelia, distracted, Kimberly Gilbert’s kaleidoscopic fusion of modern dance, fractured Shakespearean prose, and jagged soundscapes. It’s hard to describe the experience of stepping inside the mind of Hamlet’s Ophelia as she […]
Finding Ophelia – Kimberly Gilbert and Taffety Punk’s newest revelation
Enter Ophelia, distracted opens June 20 at Capitol Hill Arts Workshop. The word ‘distracted’ did not originally have the meaning you’re familiar with. “We found these wonderful definitions,” says Kimberly Gilbert, speaking about the preparations for Enter Ophelia, distracted, which she conceptualized and is bringing to life with Taffety Punk Theatre Company. “What it really […]
Playing Romantic writers, the men of Bloody Poetry
“How can I capture this guy who means so many things to so many people,” asked Dan Crane, who is playing the legendary Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley in the Taffety Punk Theatre Company production of Howard Brenton’s play Bloody Poetry, playing through May 31st at Capitol Hill Arts Workshop. “The poems just punched me […]
You must be logged in to post a comment.