WASHINGTON, DC THEATER REVIEWS

What happens to the characters in a play when they’re not on stage? Do they continue to exist in a narrative limbo outside of time? Does the paradox of characters without stories parallel how we struggle to find meaning in life’s entrances and exits?...

CLUE: LIVE ON STAGE! at The Kennedy Center Opera House is a sharp and breezy murder-mystery farce right at home in DC says BWW's critic. ...

What did our critic think of DISTRICT CHOREOGRAPHER'S DANCE FESTIVAL 2024 at Dance Place?...

Nigerian ancestry, and American ideals clash, merge, and play off each other in Sojourners by playwright Mfoniso Udofia -this deeply moving play is part of the epic nine-play Ufot Cycle which follows a Nigerian American family through many cycles of life and generations. This production, presented b...

Every once in a while, you see the billing for a concert and think to yourself “That’s an interesting combination”. This was my exact thought at Wolf Trap with Broadway superstars Kristin Chenoweth and Alan Cumming on the same bill. Don’t get me wrong, their talent is not to be questioned. I...

Themes of identity, bonding, loss, self-realization and especially death permeate the numerous layers of Brandon Jacobs-Jenkins’ thought-provoking play The Comeuppance. This penetrating work explores so many layers that it is best to let the experience take you where it will. The high school reuni...

The Shakespeare Theatre Company has opened its 2024-2025 season with a fun, frothy, beautifully rendered Comedy of Errors by the theatre’s “resident playwright” William Shakespeare and directed by the company’s artistic director, Simon Godwin. Godwin layers visual and aural punch to keep the...

The National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) began their classical season this past Saturday evening in a very satisfying manner. The program was entitled Echoes of America and was conducted by the Artistic Director of The Washington Chorus Eugene Rogers....

What did our critic think of THE WAVERLY GALLERY at 1st Stage?...

What did our critic think of JAJA'S AFRICAN HAIR BRAIDING at Arena Stage?...

What did our critic think of OH MY HEART, OH MY HOME at Studio Theatre?...

Cirque Du Soleil is one of those attractions that is not easily explained because it has elements from many entertainment genres. Their shows have a very theatrical quality to them while melding circus elements in as well. At their core is fine storytelling, really good production values and dazzlin...

When summer ends many people get depressed. Let’s face it, you can’t go to the beach or your private summer home for another year. However, you can look on the bright side of things knowing that the end of summer brings a new season of audible brilliance from the mighty National Symphony Orchest...

The celebrated and now-iconic jazz vocalist and legend Billie Holiday is portrayed as a tormented “just holding on” survivor in playwright Lanie Robertson’s play Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill. The audience is transported back to the feel of this classic bar and grill to the year 1959 w...

A comforting and sweet time, The 22+ Weddings of Hugo offers a little taste of everything on the menu. It may leave you wanting something more substantial, but none the less was delicious along the way....

Jukebox musicals generally fall into one of three categories: tribute shows which try to reproduce the music and staging of an iconic musical act as closely as possible (Rain, the Beatles Tribute, for example), biographical narratives (Beautiful, the Carole King Musical and Ain't Too Proud being two...

Bandhouse Gigs, an outfit that assembles top local musicians to honor a variety of artists from Bob Dylan to the Stones, began its life outdoors at the Strathmore, honoring Nils Lofgren. For a big event Saturday with the full title “Strathmore Presents A BandHouse Gigs 20th Anniversary Tribute to ...

The myriad music, moods, and motifs of the “king of pop” (not to mention generic mastery of soul, rhythm and blues, funk, rock, disco, and dance-pop) Michael Jackson, are electrifyingly on display in the ingeniously cutting -edge musical MJ: The Musical now playing at the National Theatre. Not a...

The latest Righteous Brothers farewell tour pulled into the Strathmore in Bethesda Thursday, entertaining an elderly crowd who enjoyed hearing their hits from the 1960s....

Soft Power at Signature Theatre, is lush and polished, wacky and worrisome, absurdist and cautionary. It’s a tightrope of high political stakes and a zany montage of the US and China. As we head into high season of the 2024 election, the timing is perfect for staging the recently revised musical b...

We usually associate circuses with acrobats and clowning; it never occurs to us to think of circuses as an art form, with tremendous expressive potential. The New York Circus Project (NYCP), takes the art of the circus one dramatic step further.  Currently on its first national tour with their pro...

Edge of the Universe Theater, in association with Avant Bard Theatre, turns up the family drama in an intimate, edgy production of A Number, directed by Stephen Jarrett, starring a real-life father and son.  ...

It’s been 40 years since the national tour of the 1982 Arthur Kopit/Maury Yeston Tony Award winning Broadway musical Nine played at the Kennedy Center. It is currently the latest entry into the Broadway Center Stage series and boasts an all-star cast, a large orchestra and an “interesting” con...

Noises Off remains the hardest to perform play ever written, as well as one of the easiest and most fun to watch. The Play That Goes Wrong tried to surpass it, but it can't be done. Playwright Michael Frayn's 1982 play could be called a love letter to theatre people if it weren't the play that threa...

The talented actress and sometime playwright has appeared in dozens of shows in D.C. — and several at Signature, including an award-winning performance in its Ragtime last year. Here, she shares her passion for jazz singers from the golden era that have never gone out of style in a personable revu...