319 stories by "Robert Michael Oliver"
Sometimes the viewer of a theatrical experience can only sit in wonder at the spectacle, not because elephants dance on soccer balls or trapeze artists spiral on silken threads, but be…
The Elevator Repair Service’s production of The Select (The Sun also Rises) opened at the Lansburgh Theatre Monday, and I’m certain that Earnest Hemingway’s 1926 debut nove…
Regina Carter and her violin: a human voice has never sounded so true. If you get a chance to experience Regina Carter: Simply Ella, the jazz quintet composed of Regina Carter (violin), Marv…
Some plays survive the test of time. Arthur Miller’s All My Sons is such a play. And the production mounted by The George Washington University’s Department of Theatre and Dance …
They sure don’t make kings like they used to. And maybe that’s a good thing. Mike Bartlett’s historical fantasy, King Charles III, based loosely (very loosely) on the cu…
To understand the voice of Jazzmeia Horn — whether it’s embodying her own ballad, the cleverly romantic, soft “Legs and Arms,” or taking on the role of an instrumenta…
Lillian Hellman’s Watch on the Rhine came to DC for a command performance on January 25, 1942. The occasion: Franklin Roosevelt’s 60th birthday. America had just entered World Wa…
Now playing at the Folger Theater, a new adaptation of Shakespeare’s As You Like It, directed by Gaye Taylor Upchurch and produced in association with Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festiva…
Mack, Beth by Chris Stezin, now playing at The Keegan Theatre, is a Macbeth for the Cyber Age. Set in a world where death by dagger is replaced by death by fake news, Mack, Beth makes a pers…
Tom Stoppard’s The Hard Problem isn’t so much about consciousness and the existence of subjectivity, “the hard problem” elucidated by contemporary Australian philosop…
On occasion, a play comes along with a bit of history, a bit of uncovered history, and that history changes the nature of the universe. Silent Sky is that sort of play. Lauren Gunderson's bi…
For those who are familiar with Richard Nelson’s 4-play cycle, The Apple Family Plays, his The Gabriels: Election Year in the Life of One Family, now on stage at the Kennedy CenterR…
Philip Dawkins’ Charm takes on a high order: it wants to charm you. And to do that its lead character, Mama, has to be more than charming. She has to charm your disbelief, your cynical…
Messiah is perhaps the best known of the German-born but London-settled composer George Frideric Handel. Profoundly religious, the three-part Oratorio moves from the prophecy of Christ to…
Ironically, and full of unintended consequences, while watching Pointless Theatre's production of Alfred Jarry's King Ubu  (yes, that’s who wrote this play, translated afresh by Goo…
The Greatest Holiday Special (N)ever, by Silver Spring Stage in collaboration with The Coil Project (a local company that writes and produces original work), is the perfect Christmas show fo…
Picnic comes to Catholic. And by the time it's over, lives are overturned, dreams are rekindled, and who knows what will happen next. William Inge, master playwright of the heartland, cap…
“Jonah,” I said to myself as soon as I laid eyes upon the set of Lookingglass Theatre Company’s Moby Dick. Large, curved rib-bones thrusting upward, form a cradle: “I…
“We are not a monolith! We are not a monolith! We are not a monolith!” chanted the six-member cast at the start of Woolly Mammoth's Second City's Black Side of the Moon. And, ind…
Young Jean Lee’s theatre, entitled Young Jean Lee’s Theater Company (2003-2016), was dedicated to producing “shows written and directed by Young Jean Lee.” The compan…
America is but an expensive iPhone. If you’ve got that, and its Pink with a sexy ringtone, then you’re in, as in the “in” crowd. Now, all you need is a baby. Or so se…
Sheila Jordan loves jazz. Sheila Jordan loves singing. Sheila Jordan really loves jazz singing. And we feel truly blessed to have spent an evening in the presence of that love. For those who…
The 18th century French playwright and philosopher Denis Diderot is known best among theatre folk for his theoretical writings: on the actor, the 4th Wall, and the emergence of scenogr…
The 1989 musical City of Angels opened last night at Catholic University’s Hartke Theatre, offering its appreciative audience a glimpse into the past through its double filtered lens. …
Five actors, a stage manager, an audience, and a lot of blood. Nu Sass Productions has remounted its 2013 Capital Fringe hit, complete with gags and cornball and puppets. The pace might not …
