A Theatre-Goer's Thoughts

  The cast of Babbitt at Shakespeare Theatre Company (L to R): Matt McGrath, Ali Stroker, Ann Harada, Matthew Broderick, Nehal Joshi, Judy Kaye, Mara Davi, and Chris Myers. Playwright Joe DiPietro (a two-time Tony winner as librettist and lyricist for his musical Memphis ) has adapted Babbitt from the satirical Sinclair Lewis novel of the same name. Originally the result of a brainstorming session more than a decade ago among himself, actor Matthew Broderick, and director Christopher Ashley, to come up with a project that would give them a chance to work together. DiPietro scanned his bookshelf and came across a copy of Lewis’s novel, which set into motion all of the events that would lead to the arrival of DiPietro’s adaptation at DC’s Shakespeare Theatre Company. The play was previously produced in 2023 at San Diego’s La Jolla Playhouse (where Ashley is the current artistic director) with the same design team and several of the same cast members (including Broderick). Full disclosur

  T The Company of  Comedy of Errors during the finale . Photo credit: Theresa Castracane Photography. Shakespeare Theatre Company’s current production of Shakespeare’s Comedy of Errors , continuing through October 20 at the Klein Theatre, is a colorful, boisterous, rollicking, laugh-out-loud production. The Simon Godwin-directed show is one of Shakespeare’s shortest and most compact plays. Godwin’s production is set in a seaside village on the Mediterranean during the 1990s, which dramaturg Drew Lichtenberg notes was just ahead of when cell phones became almost universal and the Internet became such a central force in our lives. The script and the locale become springboards for Godwin and the company to embellish it with activity that Shakespeare might never have imagined, but of which he would certainly approve as the play hilariously unfolds. It begins, however, on very serious notes. The Duke of Ephesus has forbidden anyone from Syracuse to enter the city due to a trade war. Th

  Awa Sal Secka (Bea), Colby N. Muhammad (Vanessa/Sheila/Radia), Melanie Brezill (Michelle/Chrissy/LaNiece), Victoire Charles (Jaja), Bisserat Tseggai (Miriam), Jordan Rice (Marie), Tiffany Renee Johnson (Aminata), and Mia Ellis (Jennifer) in ‘Jaja’s African Hair Braiding.’ Photo by T. Charles Erickson Photography. Jaja’s African Hair Braiding is the title of the play by Ghanaian-American Jocelyn Bioh, as well as the name of the immigrant-owned small business in Harlem where the play takes place. In the play, we become a part of what begins as a typical day as its finely-drawn, unique, and colorful characters gather and the braiders ply their trade, creating singular looks for a variety of patrons. We are far into the play before Jaja herself appears, marking a very special event in her life, which will have implications for the entire “family” of the business. Over the course of just 90 minutes, we become well-acquainted with these characters and their situations to the extent that t

  Grace Yoo (top, center) as Hillary Clinton at America's most famous restaurant in  Soft Power  at Signature Theatre. Photo credit: Daniel Rader. Signature Theatre’s current offering,  Soft Power , is a musical with book and lyrics by David Henry Hwang (a Tony-winner for  M. Butterfly ) and music and additional lyrics by Jeanine Tesori (who won Tonys for  Fun Home  and  Kimberly Akimbo ). Part satire, part fantasia, even part homage to the classic American musical  The King and I , and often based on real-life events,  Soft Power  defines its own genre. As the program note tells us, “soft power” is a political strategy in which cultural influence is used to achieve diplomatic results. Think, for example, of China lending pandas to American zoos. In this instance, a Chinese theatre producer tries to convince a Chinese American playwright (known in the script simply as “DHH”) to create a show to be staged in a new theatre built in Shanghai’s Fuxing Park. (DHH is a not-very-subtly-dr

  Stephen Pasquale as Guido Contini in the Kennedy Center's production of Nine . Photo credit: Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman. From the time that Nine was announced for this season’s Broadway Center Stage series at the Kennedy Center, I have been looking forward to it. Then when Steven Pasquale was announced as the star, I became even more eager, since he made such a strong impression in the KC production of Guys and Dolls in October 2022. After seeing Signature Theatre’s production of The Bridges of Madison County a year ago, I sought out the cast recording, which starred Pasquale and beautifully demonstrated his vocal expertise. Nine is a musical based on what many consider to be Italian filmmaker Federico Fellini’s masterpiece, “8-1/2” (1963). Playwright Arthur Kopit created the libretto to accompany Maury Yeston’s Tony-winning score (both music and lyrics), which incorporates a variety of musical styles. I haven’t seen the film, but I was fortunate enough to see the ori

  Julia Masli in ha ha ha ha ha ha ha at Woolly Mammoth Theatre. Photo credit: Cameron Whitman Photography. The current offering at Woolly Mammoth, ha ha ha ha ha ha ha (which I will refer to as ha 7 ) created, written, co-directed, and performed by Estonian clown Julia Masli, fits neatly with the five Woolly Mammoth shows (one co-produced with Folger Theatre) I have seen in the past year. While they are wildly divergent in subject matter, what ties them all together is this: they would not (and most likely could not) be produced by any other professional theatre in the DC area. Woolly Mammoth’s work gives us a glimpse into a variety of cultural experiences that would not otherwise be accessible to DC audiences. They expand our horizons and challenge our preconceptions about our society and the world around us. The program introduces Julia Masli as “an award-winning clown from Estonia,” but her appearance and performance run counter to mental images of clowns that I brought to the e