More than 50 premieres will take over D.C. in fall's Women's Voices Theater Festival by Nelson Pressley

Eight years after D.C. pulled together for the six month, 100-show Shakespeare in Washington festival, the city is at it again. The Women's Voices Theater Festival is set for the fall, with …

SOURCE: Washington Post at 12:15pm on March 31, 2015☆⚑

Signature will kick up its heels with "West Side Story," "La Cage" and "Road Show" by Nelson Pressley

You knew one day we'd get another look at Stephen Sondheim's long-evolving musical "Bounce," as it was called when it appeared in 2003 at the Kennedy Center, which originally commissioned it…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 10:36am on March 30, 2015☆⚑

Another bite of the Apples for Studio's upcoming season by Nelson Pressley

"Four buoyant and moving plays," Post critic Peter Marks wrote of Richard Nelson's "Apple Family" series when the first two " "That Hopey Changey Thing" and "Sweet and Sad" " were produced s…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 12:33pm on March 29, 2015☆⚑

Aggressive diversity at Woolly, all women at Rep, and the brand-new Fringe by Nelson Pressley

The 2015-16 theater news is pouring in: Woolly Mammoth has settled on its slate of six characteristically edgy plays anchored by a Sheila Callaghan world premiere, Columbia's Rep Stage has p…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 12:27pm on March 26, 2015☆⚑

Early Kushner and a play on domestic violence, now playing in little rooms by Nelson Pressley

Tony Kushner's epic "A Bright Room Called Day" takes place in a living room, but can you actually perform it in a living room? That's the gambit by the upstart Nu Sass Productions as it trie…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 11:59am on March 25, 2015☆⚑

Backstage with Jesus and Hitler in Ruhl's epic 'Passion Play' by Nelson Pressley

The temptations of Sarah Ruhl's "Passion Play" include cameos by Elizabeth I, Adolf Hitler and Ronald Reagan, each briefly swanning through with a stateliness that keeps them well above the …

SOURCE: Washington Post at 11:42am on March 25, 2015☆⚑

True to the quest, STC delivers a noble 'La Mancha' by Nelson Pressley

When Anthony Warlow squares up and sings the title song in "Man of La Mancha," you won't find many people in Sidney Harman Hall complaining that the 1965 musical about fighting unbeatable fo…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 3:20pm on March 24, 2015☆⚑

The apocalypse comes to the Lower East Side in the new musical 'Soon' by Nelson Pressley

The songs in Nick Blaemire's pleasantly quirky new musical "Soon" are driven by guitars and a keyboard, but it's not quite a rock score. The music is full of strums and easygoing pulses; the…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 1:04pm on March 23, 2015☆⚑

Impossible dream: young director brings musicals to Shakespeare Co. by Nelson Pressley

When the Shakespeare Theatre Company expanded into the 775-seat Sidney Harman Hall in 2007, there was no way Artistic Director Michael Kahn could have known that a 22- year-old intern on a n…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 4:45pm on March 20, 2015☆⚑

Scalia and the intern, punching from right and left in 'The Originalist' by Nelson Pressley

Is the bulldog conservative justice we see parading up and down the stage in "The Originalist" the Antonin Scalia? That's a verdict for the Supreme Court justice's intimates and close observ…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 4:45pm on March 20, 2015☆⚑

Ageless Lansbury puts fizz in "Blithe Spirit" by Nelson Pressley

Who is Angela Lansbury to you " Jessica Fletcher? Mame? Mrs. Lovett? Mrs. Potts?The 89-year-old wonder is currently Madame Arcati in Noel Coward's chestnut "Blithe Spirit," and if a supporti…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 5:58pm on March 19, 2015☆⚑

Renee Calarco on the jailed 'Indian Jones' rabbi and her new play at Theater J by Nelson Pressley

Rabbi Menachem Youlus was known as the "Jewish Indiana Jones" for his adventurous tales of rescuing Torahs from European sites that included prison camps. The sagas lent alluring cache to th…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 4:51pm on March 18, 2015☆⚑

Classic antics of 'Laugh' an uphill climb in Beth Henley's latest by Nelson Pressley

Forget pratfalls and pies in the face, though Beth Henley's oddball new "Laugh" certainly goes in for both. The bizarre-o sights in the premiere production at Studio Theatre include a corpul…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 3:19pm on March 16, 2015☆⚑

Olney Theatre Center lands new Moises Kaufman project by Nelson Pressley

The Olney Theatre Center has a major catch for next season: the premiere of "Carmen: An Afro-Cuban Jazz Musical" by Moises Kaufman, ringleader of the Tectonic Theater Project ( renowned for …

SOURCE: Washington Post at 9:30am on March 16, 2015☆⚑

After "The Jacksonian," Beth Henley recharges with slapstick "Laugh" by Nelson Pressley

Beth Henley, where ya been?Henley won a 1981 Pulitzer for the loopy "Crimes of the Heart," and it felt like a long overdue reemergence when she scored an off-Broadway hit two years ago with …

SOURCE: Washington Post at 6:55pm on March 13, 2015☆⚑

After Broadway heights of "Glory Days," back home with "Soon" by Nelson Pressley

It's been seven years since the musical "Glory Days" catapulted from Signature Theatre to Broadway and went down in a blaze of, you know. The show, written by two 23-year-old local lads, clo…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 12:31pm on March 13, 2015☆⚑

April's Hayes Awards to be at Lincoln Theatre by Nelson Pressley

Two bits of news about the Helen Hayes Awards on April 6:It won't be an open bar party like last year's event in the National Building Museum's atrium. Back into the theater, everyone! In th…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 7:03pm on March 11, 2015☆⚑

Enter, stage (far) right: new play about Justice Scalia in production at Arena by Nelson Pressley

In the case of Scalia v. Gero, Antonin Scalia stared down Edward Gero as the actor visited the Supreme Court to observe the justice at work."We locked eyes for about 15 seconds," says Gero, …

SOURCE: Washington Post at 12:21pm on March 6, 2015☆⚑

En garde! Swashbuckling and Shakespeare coming soon from Synetic by Nelson Pressley

Shhh! More "silent" Shakespeare is on tap from Synetic Theatre, which is bringing back two hits and creating a new wordless take on the Bard for its 2015-16 season. The year in DC theater is…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 8:58am on March 3, 2015☆⚑

Life after a teen kidnapping in new Kander-Pierce musical 'Kid Victory' by Nelson Pressley

The wind comes sweepin' down the plain in that famous song about Oklahoma, but the breeze will chill your blood in the emotionally fractured Kansas of the new musical "Kid Victory." The flat…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 4:00pm on March 2, 2015☆⚑

Avast! Sunny pirates, a frosty 'Frozen' and a forecast from Shaw by Nelson Pressley

By the time we get to the year 3000 Baghdad is the capital of Britain, at least according to George Bernard Shaw's astonishingly futuristic "Back to Methuselah." But the setting is Ireland, …

SOURCE: Washington Post at 10:50am on February 25, 2015☆⚑

D.C.'s women's theaters, emerging on the cheap by Nelson Pressley

There's no argument: Women are dramatically underrepresented on Washington's stages. So sayeth the overwhelming majority of D.C. area troupes, which will coalesce en masse this fall as about…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 2:58pm on February 20, 2015☆⚑

"Menagerie" and "110 in the Shade" among next season's Americana at Ford's by Nelson Pressley

Ford's Theatre will balance a world premiere and vintage Americana " a musical and a cornerstone drama " in its 2015-16 season (with "A Christmas Carol" as its centerpiece, of course). The f…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 6:12am on February 18, 2015☆⚑

Fading into the woods with D'Amour's mysterious 'Cherokee' by Nelson Pressley

Civilization crumbled to bits in Lisa D'Amour's "Detroit," the Pulitzer finalist about two struggling couples. Suburban routine gave way to alarmingly primitive impulses that Woolly Mammoth …

SOURCE: Washington Post at 5:14pm on February 16, 2015☆⚑

The '80s are back with a vengeance in Wilson's 'King Hedley II' at Arena by Nelson Pressley

If you've ever seen August Wilson's bleak and angry "King Hedley II," you remember its central image: an ex-con with a terrifying scar on his face trying like mad to get flowers to grow in a…

SOURCE: Washington Post at 3:33pm on February 13, 2015☆⚑