Theater Review: Delightful ‘Cabaret Macabre’
Delightful is probably not the expected adjective for a show called "Cabaret Macabre," except probably for those who have seen earlier editions of the show by Happenstance Theatre. At a…
Opera Review: ‘The Force of Destiny’
The Washington National Opera is celebrating the bicentenary of Wagner and Verdi this season, and to honor the latter, artistic director Francesca Zambello has chosen what she called one of…
Theatre Review: ‘The Two-Character Play’
In the early 1970s, Tennessee Williams' best work was decades behind him. "A Streetcar Named Desire," "The Glass Menagerie" )now in yet another acclaimed revival on Broadway) and "Cat on…
Theater Review: ‘Red Speedo’ at Studio
"Red Speedo," a taut play about athletic competition at Studio Lab, itself begins with its own athletic contest: climbing several flights of stairs to the performance space. Once up there,…
‘Million Dollar Quartet’ at Kennedy Center
There may not be a better musical focus for a jukebox musical than the sounds of Memphis' plucky Sun Studios in the 1950s, where Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee…
WNO Math: ‘Tristan + Isolde’ – Voigt
The problem with building an opera around a star is that sometimes, the star will falter. So even as the cover of the Washington National Opera Playbill of "Tristan and…
Things I Learned At Capital Fringe
You may picture me stuck to my television 24/7 from the writings in this blog, but for a good chunk of the past year, I've been going out to sample theater…
Theatre Review: ‘The Book of Mormon’
"The Book of Mormon" is the musical that ate the Kennedy Center. Demand for tickets was so large in March it crashed the computer system. Traffic snarled as people stood…
Theatre Review: ‘Stupid @#$%ing Bird’
Reinventing theater is easier said than done – and easier still said with an expletive. Thus we have Aaron Posner’s "Stupid @#$%ing Bird," an adaptation of Chekhov’s "The Seagull" that just…
Four Current Plays: ‘Optimism’ to ‘The Golem’
By the time Voltaire got around to writing Candide, he had been kicked out of Paris a couple of times for his outspoken work. The 1759 book, whose subtitle was “or…