DCMetroTheaterArts
Your source for theater news, reviews, and interviews in DC, MD, Northern VA, and New York
Intimate Apparel is the story of a woman named Esther. In 1905, Esther is a 35-year-old woman who lives in a rooming house with other single ladies. She is a skilled seamstress who makes her living creating beautiful intimate apparel – intricately detailed corsets, slips, and lingerie. Her talent is matched only by her discretion, […]
“I am a giant surrounded by ants!” exclaimed Walter Lee Younger in a scene from A Raisin in the Sun. Walter is the embodiment of how society, family members, and internal struggle can defer dreams. Written by the gone but much remembered Lorraine Hansberry, this forward-looking and timeless play was truthfully directed by Tazewell Thompson […]
Everyman Theatre (“Everyman”) continues its 2016/2017 season with an ambitious production: Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations. A work of literature epic in scope and scale, the most notable challenge in this version of the piece – as adapted for the stage by Gale Childs Daly – is that a cast of merely six actors is tasked […]
Here are the DCMetroTheaterArts Staff’s honorees for Best Direction of Musicals in Professional Theaters in 2016. Congrats to all our honorees: David James for A Christmas Carol at Toby’s The Dinner Theatre of Columbia. Matt Lenz for A Christmas Story: The Musical at The Hippodrome Theatre. Pierre-Jacques Brault A Christmas Story: The Musical at Riverside Center for the Performing Arts. […]
One of the most powerful musical dramas of the 20th century has just opened at The Kennedy Center, home of the Washington National Opera, for a one-week run. And theater lovers who long for the towering achievements of Broadway’s heyday—the 1940s, when names like Gershwin, Hammerstein and Weill dominated the stage—had better scramble if they want […]
In the scorching, emotional and honest opera of man in search of redemption, the opera–Lost in the Stars, now playing as part of the Washington National Opera series at the Kennedy Center —is a searing exploration of transformative, radical Christianity. Based on the classic South African novel, Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton, the themes […]
In Opera Lafayette‘s Catone in Utica, which opened last night at The Kennedy Center’s Terrace Theater, the greats have come out to sing. And Antonin Vivaldi’s opera bursts with beauty and excitement. There is the Roman Senator, Catone (Cato), given dignity by the elegance and strength of Thomas Michael Allen. Statuesque in appearance, his vocal style […]
Appomattox, the world premiere opera now playing at The Kennedy Center Opera House in a new production by the Washington National Opera, tackles that most epic of America’s sins, “the color line.” And we tremble at the implications. The producers of Appomattox could not have foreseen the horror of recent events in Paris, Beirut, over […]
In the wake of Ferguson and the Black Lives Matter movement, it is the perfect time for an opera which tells the truth about race in America—Appomattox. Philip Glass, the internationally acclaimed composer, and Christopher Hampton, the British Academy Award-winning writer, have created a complex, substantive and deeply fulfilling work, which showcases the best and […]
Oh, the tears, trauma and travail of the issues brought to the fore in the revised World Premiere of the opera Appomattox at the Kennedy Center Opera House Friday night. This challenging World Premiere by renowned modern composer Philip Glass (the opera Einstein on the Beach and the film score of The Hours) and librettist Christopher […]
Feelin’ Blue? Are you a violist who’s feeling unwanted and underappreciated? Then run down to UrbanArias‘ entertaining and high-strung English sung short opera Blue Viola, and you’ll be playing more inspiring music when you leave the intimate Artisphere Black Box. Do you own a Stradivarius violin? Then you too should be russian over there, and I […]
Lynn Nottage’s Pulitzer-winning drama Ruined made its Baltimore premiere at Everyman Theatre officially opening last night, offering a powerfully poignant portrait of barbarically ravaged women who endure continuing conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo with quiet stamina and remarkably resiliency. Directed by internationally-acclaimed director Tazewell Thompson (well known internationally for his work in both the […]
Things were very fiery this past Friday night at the GMU Center for the Arts as the Virginia Opera brings a new and exciting full-scale production of Bizet’s Carmen, one of the most renowned and certainly most dramatic operas in history, to the Fairfax establishment, A four-Act work with a French libretto, but set in […]
ARENA STAGE AT THE MEAD CENTER FOR AMERICAN THEATER ANNOUNCES ITS 65TH SEASON FEATURING FIVE WORLD PREMIERES, TWO MUSICALS, THREE COMEDIES AND A 25-WRITER COMMISSION FOR THE NATIONAL CIVIL WAR PROJECT Arena Stage Artistic Director Molly Smith reveals the 2014/15 season lineup for the company’s 65th season and fifth year in the Mead Center for […]
MARY T. & LIZZY K. EXTENDS THROUGH MAY 5 AT ARENA STAGE WITH SIX ADDED PERFORMANCES Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater announces that due to popular demand, the world premiere play Mary T. & Lizzy K., written and directed by Tazewell Thompson, will add another six performances to its nearly sold-out run, now extended through May 5, […]
Arena Stage Explores the Lincoln White House Tazewell Thompson’s new play Mary T. & Lizzy K., now playing at Arena Stage, is based on the unlikely friendship between Mary Todd Lincoln and Elizabeth Keckly, a slave who bought herself from her master and became a much admired dress designer – her clients included the wives […]