216 stories by "Christopher Henley"
Last night's thirty-first annual Helen Hayes Award ceremony was also the first annual Helen Awards ceremony. With so many more companies, so many more productions, so much more theatre in to…
"I went into it expecting to be terrified. Hanging up after talking to the agency, I thought to myself, 'Oh, I've just guaranteed myself two weeks of total stress.' But it hasn't been that w…
I can't recommend Blossom's Rainbow highly enough. This wonderfully magical new play for very young audiences just opened at The Athenaeum in Alexandria, and moves to Atlas in DC in April. I…
It's been six years since Angela Lansbury won her fifth Tony for playing Madame Arcati in a Broadway revival of Blithe Spirit. It's been nearly sixty years since she made her stage debut her…
Some readers may remember Nehal Joshi from his years as an actor in D.C. Others may know him from the roles he's played when he's come back to town, most recently Swiss Cheese in Mother Cour…
Outstanding production of 'Blue,' the new small stage experience for early childhood audiences from Imagination Stage
The post Blue, a new treat for the wee ones from Imagination Stage appea…
To the strains of "Ride of the Valkyries," the new President of the Kennedy Center, Deborah F. Rutter, took the stage of its Family Theatre on Tuesday morning to announce the Center's 2015-1…
I remember reading a biography of one of the great British actors " Laurence Olivier, I think it was. He had been doing a tour of this country. He took back to England something that wasn't …
A funny thing happened on the way to the Folger. Outside the front door, I saw a poster for its production of Mary Stuart. I was there to interview the actors playing Mary, Queen of Scots, a…
The question of the year for theatre wonks has been answered: Does the sequel hold up to the original? We've waited a long time for this particular answer " for more than four hundred years.…
The remarkably gifted George Gershwin was astoundingly prolific. He left behind an amazing musical legacy that is still wildly popular and familiar 75 years after his death at the shockingly…
Ah, the annual Helen Hayes Awards announcement ceremony. A room full of hope and tension; the hush as the names are read, broken by the occasional gasp or cheer; the surprising results mixed…
I wade into the compensation debate with some reluctance. The discourse has become startlingly heated. People care about the issues, which is a good thing. But unfortunate, incendiary, even …
"This isn't your Grandmother's Chekhov. If you are looking for the samovar…" John Lescault was describing the new play, Life Sucks (Or the Present Ridiculous) by Aaron Posner, currently in…
"It has been an autumn of change, I would say. A lot of transition." Jessica Hansen is Executive Artistic Director/Co-Founder of Lean & Hungry Theater, the company in town that produces …
"It's a hard thing to walk away from work," Jennifer L. Nelson said during our recent phone conversation. We were talking about her decision, in light of the firing by the DC Jewish Communit…
"Yes, it's an unusual part," Michael Russotto said about his lead role in Samuel D. Hunter’s The Whale, beginning January 14 at Rep Stage in Columbia. "You don't often have central cha…
Edward Gero is in his sixth consecutive year of playing Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol at Ford's Theatre. If you want to do the math, he's played the part upwards of 300 times. That c…
It's strange to say, about the components of a project called The Great Divorce, that they are a team that is returning. But they are " they're back, they being C.S. Lewis, Fellowship for Pe…
"My goal is that they [the audience] will never look at the story the same way again. This is not your Mama's Christmas Carol." In what has become an annual event, Paul Morella is bringing t…
"He wanted to do something strange and melancholic, but also very joyful." Zoë Waites was speaking about Michael Attenborough and his choice of As You Like It, which he directed at Shakes…
One of the unexpected joys of parenting, for me, has been experiencing those moments when you see your child interact with the world in a new or more engaged way and you feel a sudden wave o…
Michael Avolio, director of Quotidian Theatre Company's currently running production of Hedda Gabler, spoke with DCTS's Christopher Henley recently by e-mail about the production and its rec…
It's funny that, as influential and as storied as the experimental theatre of the 1950s and 1960s is, it remains, for the most part, lore " something you read about, think about, but don't e…
"I took the play and read it on Memorial Day in Arlington Cemetery. It was a very significant read, that day. I thought, this was the cost. We are continuing to cycle through the same proble…
