In 2006, then Washington National Opera Artistic Director Placido Domingo announced that the Opera would take on their first complete cycle of Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung). In the subsequent years, the opera produced the first three of the four-some, but not in quick succession. As the opera and the nation suffered an economic downturn, the complete cycle was never realized. Until now.
Rhode Island audiences, prepare to be dazzled. RAGTIME is - deservedly - one of the most highly acclaimed musicals of the last two decades and the touring production now playing the Providence Performing Arts Center does the show's rich legacy proud.
Known for both her contemporary and Shakespearean work, Taichman will go straight from one off-Bway show to another this year.
A gem of a musical written by The Fantasticks team of Harvey Schmidt and Tom Jones with libretto by N. Richard Nash (using his own play The Rainmaker as basis) is about a con man coming into town to 'sell' rain to a drought-stricken, Depression-era Texas town, but winds up creating a miracle along the way. Schmidt and Jones' score is far superior to their tour-de-force The Fantasticks, while Nash's libretto is bit on the sugary side yet it is still a beautiful tale of miracles happening in the most unlikely of places.
Shakespeare Theatre Company proves once again their place as one of the nation's finest classical theatre companies with a new production of OTHELLO. A careful blend of grand spectacle and intimate relationships, William Shakespeare's mature tragedy leaps off of the stage with passion, wit, and pathos. Starring Pakistani-American Faran Tahir in the title role, this OTHELLO is filtered through the lens of Othello as a Muslim who has adopted Western dress and religion. The concept works and the tragedy still works as one of Shakespeare's best.
Theatre criticism and the relationship to the show's creators gives a lot of food for thought in the Guthrie's combination of two one-act comedies, THE CRITIC and THE REAL INSPECTOR HOUND.
Watching Guards at the Taj, you can't help but notice that the philosophical debate between the two guards is still ongoing in various facets of society - that of the idealist versus the realist, struggling to find common ground. That's what makes this a thought-provoking production and Joseph's words incredibly powerful.
Memories painful and poignant intermingle through a smoky haze in the sharp and vivid production of Tennessee Williams THE GLASS MENAGERIE now onstage at Ford's Theatre. Painstakingly directed by Mark Ramont, the production boasts a superb cast of actors whose nuanced and detailed performances mine the emotional depths of Williams' early and personal play.
It's fitting that Shakespeare Theater's Artistic Director Michael Kahn has created an evening that bookends the pathetic theater critics of the 18th century with criticism in our own day. His cracker-jack, double casting results in a fun evening with star turns-and slapstick routines-galore.
The Washington National Opera has always been a champion for young artists, both on stage and off. The WNO's American Opera Initiative's premier production of Better Gods is a testimony to that. Composed with ethnical truth by Luna Pearl Woolf, Better Gods is a stirring portrait of a determined Queen who must decide whether she should give up her crown or her soul.
Every artistic company wishes it could come up with a seasonal title that could be come a holiday tradition - their own Nutcracker, Messiah or Christmas Carol to rely on every December.
The Ford's Theatre 2015-2016 season continues with A CHRISTMAS CAROL by Charles Dickens and adapted by Michael Wilson, now through December 31, 2015. Celebrated Washington stage actor Edward Gero returns for the seventh year to play Ebenezer Scrooge. BroadwayWorld has a first look at Gero and company onstage below!
Appomattox is being presented as a world premiere of a revised version. For those unaware, the opera started out as an opera in 2007, was transformed into a play and now is an opera again. After Saturday night's opening, it would appear that more rewrites are needed.
WNO's season continues with the world premiere of the newly revised version of Appomattox, the first opera WNO has presented by the iconic American composer Philip Glass, with a libretto by the Academy Award-winning writer Christopher Hampton, November 14-22 in the Opera House. In the first act, we eavesdrop on history as the Civil War comes to its final resolution at the courthouse in Appomattox. Then, in the newly composed second act, we fast- forward 100 years to the time of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. as the struggle for civil rights continues. BroadwayWorld has a first look below!
At the dawn of a new century, everything is changing…and anything is possible. RAGTIME returns to the road in an all-new touring production that Bloomberg News hails as "explosive, thrilling and nothing short of a masterpiece." North America will be swept away by this ravishing and relevant production, with performances starting Tuesday, October 27 at the Smith Center for the Performing Arts in Las Vegas. BroadwayWorld has as first look at the cast in action below!
SALOME is a visually stunning world premiere that brings us deeply complex characters struggling for command and dignity in one of history's most highly contested strips of land. Yael Farber, the award-winning adaptor-director, returns to the Shakespeare Theatre Company. With SALOME she has shaped a compelling work of power and contradiction. This production upends the traditional view of Salome, considering her as principled and calculated rather than a monstrous harlot. Here, Salome uses the tools she has - access, sensuality, brains - to effect change. Even within the limitations society placed on her, Salome sees opportunity.
Jessica Dickey's world-premiere comedic drama THE GUARD, currently playing at Ford's Theatre, paints masterful depictions of not only Rembrandt and Homer, but also those in modern times who cherish their works and wish to find beauty and memory themselves.
Ford's Theatre Society welcomes Tim Getman (Round House's Rapture, Blister, Burn; Fool for Love), Mitchell Hebert (Ford's The Laramie Project), Josh Sticklin (Keegan Theatre's Midsummer Night's Riot), Kathryn Tkel (Kennedy Center's Mockingbird) and Craig Wallace (Ford's The Laramie Project, Our Town, Necessary Sacrifices, others) will comprise the cast of THE GUARD, a world-premiere comedic drama by playwright Jessica Dickey. THE GUARD is directed by Sharon Ott and will play at Ford's Theatre, now through October 18, 2015. BroadwayWorld has a first look at the cast onstage below!
Washington National Opera began what may be one of its more artistically challenging seasons Saturday with the most crowd-pleasing production.
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