Now is the time seize the day! Or in this case, “Carpe scaena!” And seize the stage like they did! Street Lamp Productions presentation of Disney’s Newsies, Directed and Choreographed by Bambi Johnson, is well worth the drive to Rising Sun, MD. I reckon it may be a bit out of the way for some Baltimore City folk, (Admittedly, had my mother not lived in Colora for over eleven years, I may not have known about it either.) but I promise you it’s worth the trip.
Watch and you’ll see— you too can be— part of their world! If you book your tickets quickly, that is, you too can be a part of the irresistible holiday magic happening at Toby’s Dinner Theatre this Christmas. Presenting Disney’s The Little Mermaid, Directed and Choreographed by Mark Minnick with Musical Direction by Ross Scott Rawlings, this epic adventure will bring you under the sea and into the fully animated world of Disney’s cherished coming-of-age tale about a little mermaid and her dreams to be part of the human world.
High above the town, flying down, better catch it quick— it’s better than ole Saint Nick— and it may still be in other locales— but somewhere hovering over Tidewater Players…across the whole opera house stage and straight to you…comes A Christmas Story. That’s right, kids— and kids at heart— after waiting for ages in line at Higbee’s, you’ve asked Santa for that irresistible major-award of a musical, and he’s delivered— because what’s the harm in simply watching Ralphie Parker shoot his eye out with his Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle with a compass in the stock and this thing that tells time?
You certainly will feel the earth move at the National Theatre right now through the end of the year! Beautiful is just that……BEAUTIFUL. Under the direction Marc Bruni this production leaves you feeling nothing short of wonderful. I guarantee after seeing this show your toes will be tapping and you will be humming Carole King’s extraordinary music for days to come. I had the pleasure of seeing the Beautiful tour open back in 2015 at the Providence Preforming Arts Center in Providence,
You only have one weekend left to see My Fair Lady at Third Wall Productions and I recommend that you do! It is no secret that I dig this company of families, friends, and volunteers who gather out of love to perform three shows a season in the sanctuary of St. Thomas on Providence Road. One of the many ways that their stalwart leader, Mike Zellhofer, shows his generosity is by giving fresh directors an opportunity to work on dream shows.
Come look at the freaks! Come gape at the geeks! Come examine Dundalk Community Theatre’s aberrations, their malformations— grotesque physiques…only pennies* for peeks…come look at the freaks! Come look inside the John E. Ravekes Theatre and have your curiosity satisfied with this gloriously haunting production of Side Show. Directed by Robert W. Oppel with Musical Direction by Rebecca Rossello, and Choreography by Vincent Musgrave, this breathtaking story is a circus marvel that twists and turns your mind and heart inside out and upside down all along its treacherous trail.
You’ll shoot your— wait. No. That’s later. Before you shoot your eye out with your Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle with a compass in the stock and this thing that tells time, have your turkey gobbled up by the Bumpuses hellhound dogs, and do the leg-lamp kick-line for your Major Award, settle into 1968 at the Harper’s Hardware Store annual Christmas Party! And guess what? There’s a wintery surprise— because this year?
You’ll shoot your eye out! You’ll shoot your eye out! You’ll shoot your eye out when you hear just how many different theatres are all doing A Christmas Story this Christmas season!! BUT— fear not! St. Gabriel Miracle Players are the first AND they are the only ones to be doing the non-musical version! So you won’t find any leg-lamp kick-lines at St. Gabriel’s this November, but you will find a talented bunch of youngsters and youngsters at heart doing their seasonal magic on the Miracle Players’ stage to bring you that timeless— since 1983— tale of little Ralphie,
A little scratch gives you character, unless you’re a 45-vinyl, in which case it just causes you to skip a lot. The Strand Theatre has a whole lot of character and more importantly they have the message. They have the message of love with their production of Dominique Morisseau’s Detroit ’67, directed by Erin Riley. Powerful, evocative, visceral— this stunning drama set in the heart of the “colored district in downtown Detroit in the midst of the race riots” is poignant and disturbing in its relevance to the modern day.
A new world calls across Charm City! A new world calls across street. A new world whispers through Mt. Vernon— time to see— time to see…it is time to see Songs For a New World at The Audrey Herman Spotlighters Theatre. Co-Directed by Andrea Bush and Michael Tan, and Musical Direction by Michael Tan, four talented voices come together on the stage to sing songs of love and hope. Fitting well into the Season57 theme of ‘Strong Voices’,
God, that’s good! Yum…is that a pie fit for a king? A wondrous sweet— a most delectable thing! Well, I am no king (nor have I shaved the faces of any) but the pies in Kensington Arts Theatre’s production of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street are to die for. Sit yourself at one of the rustically ill-sanded picnic tables just at the foot of the stage and if you dare (and are very lucky) you might just sneak a snack during the opening of Act II!
First— there are such thing as vampires.
Second— this is the third performance in the three-show The Horror Rep with We Happy Few in residence at the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop. This is Dracula, directed by Robert Pike, adapted from Bram Stoker’s novel, and devised to the stage by Grant Cloyd, Keith Hock, Meg Lowey, Kerry McGee, Robert Pike, and Jon Reynolds. This is fierce.
“Tale as old as time” perfectly describes this musical and I can’t think of one person that hasn’t watched this classic Disney movie, or most recently the remake in 2017. Beauty and the Beast at Damascus Theatre Company under the direction of Lee Michele Rosenthal and musical direction by Marci Shegogue will leave you feeling magical and uplifted, however there are a few bumps along the path. I must admit, this iconic Disney film is one of my favorites,
Women are strong. When most people think of war, the first image that comes to their mind is that of a man charging into battle. It wasn’t until last year that our military opened the doors for women to serve in combat roles. In spite of this, women serving in and alongside the military have faced the horrors of war just as valiantly men have, and they too have suffered the consequences of such violence.
Who, precisely, is the title character in Brave Spirits Theatre’s production of The Changeling, by Thomas Middleton and William Rowley, is left open to interpretation. The text of the play speculates on the question but does not provide a definitive answer. Director Charlene V. Smith takes that tone of ambiguity and plays with it brilliantly in her approach to the script. She takes a late-Renaissance play that features violence, misogyny, and sexual assault as major plot elements,
Have you heard? There’s a rumor that St. Petersburg— is coming straight to Washington D.C.! No longer far away or long ago, glowing brighter than an ember, it’s here to see, a breathtaking show, one you will always remember… Anastasia— a wintery wondrous fairytale arriving in time for the Thanksgiving season now on the Eisenhower stage of The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Commissioned by Dmitry Bogachev, with Book by Terrence McNally and Music &
The Toxic Avenger, directed by Jeffery Lesniak, is a musical based on the movie of the same name and both a playful parody of the superhero genre and of conventional musical theatre sensibilities. The plot revolves around a toxic dump of a fictional New Jersey town called Tromaville and its dark knight—Melvin Ferd the Third, a sweet, stereotypical nerd with a crush on his pretty (and blind—beware there are a lot of blind jokes that get old quickly) librarian friend Sarah and deep-seated convictions about cleaning up the town and calling out the corrupt mayor Babs Belgoody.
Hear the loud theatrical bells— brazen bells! What tale of terror now, their turbulency tells! In the startled ear of night— amid a Horror Rep of fright— how they scream out with delight— of We Happy Few’s A Midnight Dreary. They clearly keep on ringing, much do the praises that I’m singing, of their Horror Rep’s production of Edgar Allan Poe and his various death knells, and storms that quell,
A couple of minutes is all it takes; your life can change just like that. In these unsettling and disturbing times of political unrest and social unease with humanity caught dangling in the balance between civility and annihilation, it is no surprise that Everyman Theatre is once more producing two time Pulitzer Prize-winning dramatist Lynn Nottage. This time it’s her core-shaking production of Sweat, Directed by the company’s Artistic Director, Vincent M.
Every holiday season I search the idiot box for that feel-good show of the year. Little did I know that this year I would find it at the Chesapeake Arts Center, in Stand Up For…Theatre’s La Cage Aux Folles. Like Macy’s, Best Buy, SUFT brings Christmas early; only instead of a big box they use a black box.
Before I dive into the cast, crew, and show itself,
The real King John of England has a murky reputation. We know him for the Magna Carta. We know him as a villain from the tales of Robin Hood. And, at a stretch, we know him as Shakespeare’s earliest monarch, chronologically. Folger Theatre capitalizes on a chance to tell the rarely-told tale of this questionable king in its current production of Shakespeare’s King John, directed by Aaron Posner.
As the Folger describes,
Oh, God! I Hate Shakespeare! That’s right! I said it! I do! I really hate Shakespeare! I just don’t get it! How a mediocre actor from a measly little town is suddenly the brightest jewel in England’s royal crown! Oh, God, I HATE SHAKESPEARE! His plays are wordy— ooh. Wait. Maybe I shouldn’t sing all about it. Something is rotten in the state of— Essex!? Actually that’s sort of funny (Essex is in Shakespeare somewhere…isn’t it?) No,
John Webster is, perhaps, an even better patron saint for Brave Spirits than William Shakespeare: he brings both the verse, and the violence with The Duchess of Malfi. Katie Culligan brings the Duchess’ power from her first silent moments on stage. She is strong and self-possessed, charming and beautiful, grounded and passionate. Her performance is closely nuanced at every moment.
The villain of the piece is Ferdinand, her brother,
Fun fact: The story of Beauty and the Beast was originally published in 1740 as “La Belle et La Bête,” a French tale written by Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Gallon de Villeneuve (now, that’s a mouthful!) Oddly enough, there weren’t any talking clocks or candelabras involved in that iteration. Two and a half centuries later, Disney turned it into the animated classic most modern audiences are familiar with. It has also been adapted for the stage,
Silver Spring Stage’s production of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, directed by Craig Allen Mummey, tells the story of a fictionalized Salem, Massachusetts in 1692 as a stark fear of witchcraft spreads through the town. Miller’s story, famously an allegory for 1950’s McCarthyism, steps audiences through the dark pervasiveness of paranoia.
Standout performances include Melanie A. Lawrence as Tituba, Sophia Stringer as Mary Warren, Lennie Magida as Rebecca Nurse, Omar LaTiri as Reverend Hale,
After their inaugural season struck gold with the latest reworking of Chess, a jubilant celebration of In the Heights, and a megawatt production of Pulitzer Prize winner How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, all of which rivaled or improved upon their latest Broadway incarnations, The Broadway Center Stage concert series at the Kennedy Center has set a high standard with their ambitious and impressive pop-up musicals.
Ladies and gentlemen! Boys and girls! Children of all ages! Step right up to The Heritage Players and see The Greatest Show on Earth! Why it’s a miracle! Of course, miracle is a pretty fancy word for humbug, or so Mrs. Barnum will tell you. But a bit of brass and humbug is just as good as silver and gold, Mr. P.T. Barnum will tell you than himself! Barnum, the musical of the circus legend tumblesaults its way up the aisles of the Thomas Rice Auditorium at the Spring Grove Hospital Campus and onto the stage of The Heritage Players,
Haute Patooties! Bless my soul! Haute Patooties! They’ve got rock-n-roll! The Haute Patooties— your very own Baltimore-based Guerilla Theatre Group— are rocking-and-rolling with their very own Rocky Horror Show and its wild, simply put. Think you know Rocky Horror? Think again; come rediscover it, see it in a new light, and experience the collaborative effort that is a cult-classic musical done up right-n-different with Haute Patooties this Halloween season.
Fall is the perfect season for love, magic, and hopeless romantics. The magical possibilities and enduring love story of Brigadoon at Rockville Musical Theatre under the direction of Laura W. Andruski and musical direction of Joseph Sorge unfortunately left me feeling flat. In a world that is full of hate, disregard, and conflict there was so much excitement as I drove down 270 to get whisked away to the magical land of Brigadoon,
While the autumn breezes finally rush in, bringing all the productions of Rocky Horror Show and Deathtrap along with them, The Maryland Ensemble Theatre defies the more conventional approach to the spooky season and instead invites a uniquely chilling entity onto its stage for the month of Halloween and beyond. Let the Right One In, a stage adaptation by Jack Thorne from the Swedish novel & film by John Ajvide Lindqvist,