Remember when Election Day actually meant something? In my family, the adults ran to the polling place first thing and at night my grandfather threw a results party with shucked oysters and …
Many women of a certain age can recall when their mothers pulled down a volume of The Secret Garden, usually illustrated, from the book shelf and said "Here, I think you will like this. I kn…
Sometimes you just get in your own way. Dragging my heels on Fences at Everyman due to a horrible cold and my dogged belief it is not my favorite August Wilson play"Pulitzer Prize and love f…
Full disclosure. Back in the day as a features reporter, I covered not one, but two Pillsbury Bake-Offs"including the one in San Diego where teenagers kidnapped the life-size Pillsbury Dough…
Want to get inside a woman's brain? The world premiere Animal, by British playwright Clare Lizzimore, part of the Women's Voices Theater Festival, allows you to do just that. Staged in close…
When Molly Drexler (Holly Twyford) pleads to her wife Abby (Alyssa Wilmoth Keegan) "Protect me from those people downstairs," she isn't just blowing smoke. The Drexlers are one whoo-whee, ba…
With a silken flow and a keen eye for the realities of 18th century women, Center Stage's production of Pride and Prejudice is froth with substance. Jane Austen fans may demurely balk at the…
The Women’s Voices Theater Festival continues to smash our perceptions of “lady theater” with the full-throated Ironbound by Martyna Majok, which amounts to 90 minutes o…
There's a fall-ish chill in the air and a delectable thrill inside Everyman Theatre, where they are opening their 25th season with a slam-bang, conscience-prickling production of that old ch…
Hold on to the lightness and vivacity of summer for just a little while longer with Olney Theatre Center's spirited, spun-sugar confection production of Nöel Coward's Hay Fever. Director El…
Was my face red. Watching Keith Hamilton Cobb's mighty American Moor, I flushed scarlet with the knowledge of the accidental racism of my asking African American actors through the years "Do…
Stray from the path to Columbia and get thankfully lost in Toby's enchanting, enjoyable production of Into the Woods. Unlike the recent movie version, which was dark and decidedly adult, Tob…
The saying goes, all you need to become a punk rock band is three chords and the truth. Russian performance artists and feminist activists Pussy Riot couldn't play three chords but their tru…
Playwright Johnna Adams (Gideon's Knot) makes a strong case for unfettered imagination in the quirky, intense World Builders, a world premiere rom-com at the 25th anniversary of the Contempo…
Who better than a feckless linguist with commitment issues to be a live-in counselor for a nice couple from Missouri having marriage problems? That's the situation in Michael Weller's (Moonc…
Fashion is pain, beauty is suffering and thin is in in the chic black comedy Everything You Touch, playwright Sheila Callaghan's faboo-looking treatise on body shaming, art and finding your …
As any horror movie will tell you: don't go into the basement. You never know what you'll find there. In the case of Occupied Territories, a visceral and stunning new work from Theater Allia…
Sign of a good time had by all? Patrons of Everyman Theatre's Blithe Spirit in the parking garage elevator making plans to return for another performance. Grandchildren, reluctant spouses, N…
With his elegant diction and carriage and talent for genteel mimicry, Philip Goodwin makes a fine Kenneth Tynan. He shows the man as rather a ruin — in the throes of emphysema, his fin…
Too bad you can't smoke in theaters anymore. After a few hours witnessing the climactic goings-on in Woolly Mammoth's superb production of Sarah Ruhl's In the Next Room or the vibrator play,…
The Kit Kat Club roars to life with trashy, Weimar-era decadent splendor in Signature Theatre's smashing production of Cabaret, directed and choreographed by Matthew Gardiner. Based on Chris…
The world premiere musical Marley, based on the reggae giant Bob Marley, is jamming with righteous rhythms, spiritual power and a potent message about love, justice and revolution. With Balt…
When was the last time theater was a white-knuckle experience? Seventy-five minutes of heart-pounding, cold sweat, and conscience-prickling tension are yours for the taking at Factory 449's …
The 70th anniversary of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Carousel finds the musical in radiant fettle, thanks to a vital and deeply moving production at Olney Theatre Center under the direction of …
To grandmother's house we go in the subtly affecting 4000 Miles, the second half of Center Stage's Amy Herzog Festival. The first play, After the Revolution, set in 1999, delves into a proud…