Jordan Wright
November 17, 2017
Special to The Alexandria Times
Is there such a thing as a ‘tapa-palooza’? If no one’s yet invented this neologism, I offer it up as a descriptor for Signature’s shiny, splashy production of Ken Ludwig and Mike Ockrent’s musical comedy, Crazy for You. It’s the only way to explain the sensational tap extravaganza you’ll see from Director Matthew Gardiner and Choreographer Denis Jones.
 Ashley Spencer as Polly Baker, Danny Gardner as Bobby Child ~ Photo Credit – C. Stanley Photography Danny Gardner and Ashley Spencer play lead characters and love interests, Bobby and Polly, and they make the dance routines in LaLa Land look amateur. Think Fred Astaire and Eleanor Powell. Spencer is light as a feather and Gardner, who is equally as nimble, mirrors her moves with dazzling athleticism.
The storyline is basic. Banking scion Bobby Child wants to be on the stage, but his well-heeled mother, played to perfection by Sherri Edelen (who later appears as travel book author Patricia Fodor) wants none of it. The ever-versatile Natascia Diaz as Bobby’s demanding girlfriend, Irene, wants marriage – and pronto. But Bobby, ignoring their pleas, spends his time at the theater and its bevy of flashy, feathered, Follies girls presided over by Russian impresario Bela Zangler (Bobby Smith). There are too many funny bits to mention, but key in on Smith’s hilarious bottle opening bit played in tandem with Polly, and hayseed Pete’s erudite interpretation of famous playwrights. The silly one-liners and sight gags are sure to catch you off guard. They did me.
 Danny Gardner as Bobby Child, Sherri Edelen as Fodor Ashley Spencer as Polly Baker (these are the three people in the center), and the ensemble ~ Photo Credit – C. Stanley Photography Scenic Designer, Paul Tate dePoo III, gives us the look of New York’s Broadway by night – glamourous and glitzy, that is until Bobby’s mother sends him to Deadrock, Nevada to foreclose on an old family investment – a bankrupt theater where dePoo’s backdrop switches to Lank Hawkins’ (Cole Burden) saloon in a one-jalopy ghost town. There, way before Vegas was a thing, Bobby falls for the feisty postmistress Polly who keeps company with a motley crew of miners and cowboys. His plans to revive the theater and resurrect the town involve getting these drunken malingerers to dance and sing. No mean feat, but with Polly’s help, and the arrival of eight sexy chorines from New York, they do whip the Deadrock deadbeats into shape.
I found myself utterly rapt while mentally singing along to all eighteen Gershwin tunes – like “Bidin’ My Time”, “Someone To Watch Over Me”, “Slap That Bass”, “Embraceable You”, and “Nice Work If You Can Get It” conducted flawlessly by Jon Kalbfleisch’s 14-piece orchestra. But just watching these über-amazing performers dance their brains out whilst singing their lungs out was epic, especially in numbers that required complex props – farm tools and kitchen utensils to keep the beat – as in the mind-blowing number “I Got Rhythm” and the chain-rattling, floor-quaking, “Chin Up”, performed partly tabletop.
 Cole Burden as Lank Hawkins and Natascia Diaz as Irene Roth ~ Photo Credit – C. Stanley Photography Costumes by Tristan Raines run the gamut from 1930’s sparkly glam gowns, elegant black tie and frothy chorus girl costumes to dusty Western wear.
Highly recommended.
Through January 14, 2018 at Signature Theatre (Shirlington Village), 4200 Campbell Avenue, Arlington, VA 22206. For tickets and information call 703 820-9771 or visit www.sigtheatre.org.
Jordan Wright
November 16, 2017
Special to The Alexandria Times
 (L-R) Tim Rogan (Sid Sorokin) and Britney Coleman (Babe Williams) in The Pajama Game. Photo by Margot Schulman. A freshly minted production of Richard Adler and Jerry Ross’s musical, The Pajama Game, now on the Fichandler Stage, lightens the country’s mood considerably. This is not your grandmother’s version of the original 1954 classic. Director Alan Paul has condensed it for modern day audiences, but it is as fresh and applicable today as it was then. The story centers on two main characters, Babe Williams (the beautiful and talented Britney Coleman) and Sid Sorokin (Tim Rogan, a matinee idol-caliber, leading man if ever there was one). Their aims are different, their love story is not. Babe heads up the Union Grievance Committee at the Sleep-Tite Pajama Factory and Sid is the new superintendent in charge of maintaining order at the factory. Though they are operating at cross purposes under a curmudgeonly boss, Fred Hasler (played by the inimitable Ed Gero), that doesn’t put a stop to their love connection. Well, maybe a few near insurmountable crimps.
 (L-R) Paul Scanlan (Salesman), Edward Gero (Hasler) and Eddie Korbich (Hines) in The Pajama Game. Photo by Margot Schulman. In two sensational hours featuring some of the most memorable show tunes, Choreographer Parker Esse packs in a ton of dance on this reconfigured theater-in-the-round stage. It begins with an electrifying opening number, “Hurry Up”, that reflects the seamstresses’ battle for a seven-and-a-half cents’ raise and the pressure they’re under to stitch up pajamas at breakneck speed. Set Designer James Noone’s use of vintage sewing machine stations on wheels is an effective opening. Later his use of an old Coke machine, 50’s typewriters, avocado green office phones, a classic juke box and a sunshine yellow dinette set, contribute mightily to a sense of time and place.
 (L-R) Bridget Riley (Doris), Casey Wenger-Schulman (Carmen), Alexandra Frohlinger (Sandra), Nancy Anderson (Gladys), Gabi Stapula (Mae) and Heidi Kershaw Quick (Virginia) in The Pajama Game. Photo by Margot Schulman. Expect to hear favorite tunes like “There Once Was a Man”, “Slow Down” – a dance that alternates between slow motion and fast forward, cleverly performed with flying bolts of cloth and tape measures, “Hey There” – sung by Sid using an office playback machine, and “Hernando’s Hideaway” – a castanets plus jitterbug dance between Sid and the hilariously drunken Gladys (Nancy Anderson). Notable too is a duet with skirt chaser Prez (the captivatingly comic Blakely Slaybaugh) and the company’s bookkeeper Mae (the delicious Gabi Stapula) in a reprise of “Her Is”, and the factory timekeeper, Vernon Hines’ (Eddie Korbich) tap dance in “Think of the Time I Save” performed with the factory girls’ ensemble.
 (L-R) Eddie Korbich (Hines) and Donna McKechnie (Mabel) in The Pajama Game. Photo by Margot Schulman The outstanding 21-member cast includes Tony Award-winning actress, Donna McKechnie as Mabel, the boss’ secretary. Musical Director and Conductor, James Cunningham’s 12-piece orchestra, hidden beneath the stage, doubles and triples on a total of 24 instruments to give this memorable production the full complement of sound it deserves.
 Blakely Slaybaugh (Prez), Britney Coleman (Babe Williams) and cast of The Pajama Game. Photo by Margot Schulman. A big, fat, all-American hit! Highly recommended.
Through December 24th at Arena Stage, 1101 Sixth St., SE, Washington, DC 20024. For tickets and information call 202 488-3300 or visit www.ArenaStage.org.
Jordan Wright
November 7, 2017
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Presidential wannabe Kurt Seaman (John de Lancie) ~Photo by C. Stanley Photography A timely, re-engineered version of Jon Robin Baitz’s brilliantly acerbic, Trump-inspired, politically explosive, outrageously hilarious play, Vicuña and the American Experience, had audiences cheering wildly last at The Atlas. For this latest incarnation of the play, Baitz has added a dystopian ending “intended as a warning”. It imagines the country’s political landscape after a presidency built on lies and obfuscations. The two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and noted TV writer has crafted a timely play that tracks both the pre- and post- election rise of a candidate for U. S. President. As he describes it, “It’s social, political and anarchical.” And, what’s more, satisfyingly hilarious! Just what’s needed right now.
 Brian George plays Anselm Kassar – Kurt Seaman (John de Lancie) – Amir Massoud (Haaz Sleiman) ~ Photo by C. Stanley Photography Several story lines weave together to present a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the near-farcical making of a blindly egotistical Republican candidate whose chicanery and buffoonery parallel our daily news feeds. Presidential wannabe Kurt Seaman (John de Lancie), whose smarmy campaign slogan is, “Women love Seamen. Seaman [semen] Loves Women”, is a man preparing for his final debate against a female Democratic candidate. To clinch the vote, he has pressured a bespoke New York tailor with a celebrity clientele to hastily stitch up a vicuña suit. Brian George plays Anselm Kassar, the elderly and elegant Jewish tailor. His young apprentice, Amir Massoud (Haaz Sleiman), is an Iranian Muslim and Harvard educated student. The two are connected through their families’ struggles in Iran during the Shah’s persecution of political dissidents. The outspoken Amir has gotten expelled from university as a result of his attacks against the U. S. government and though he is a naturalized American citizen, his parents’ immigration status is unsure – something that the fear-mongering Seaman uses to threaten him. “If you can’t make it in your own country, what kind of people are we taking in? I call them losers,” he claims calling Muslims radical Islamist terrorists.
 Laura C. Hayes plays Srilanka ~Photo by C. Stanley Photography Laura C. Hayes plays Srilanka, the candidate’s smartly dressed, socialite daughter and campaign manager who is working feverishly on her father’s behalf to secure the women’s vote. Srilanka is brainy and driven – here depicted as a sympathetic character attempting to reign in her father’s verbal excesses, race-baiting and flip-flopping on issues. Ring a bell?
At Seaman’s insistence, Anselm promises to make a suit for him, one that is cut and fit so expertly that he will be assured a successful debate performance. Think “The Emperor’s New Clothes”. But though the suit’s imaginary powers take on near mythical proportions, Amir warns Seaman that, “the suit can’t stand in for principles.” Ah, principles, morals and truth – in such short supply today.
 Amir Massoud (Haaz Sleiman) – Kitty Finch-Gibbon (Kimberly Schraf) ~ Photo by C. Stanley Photography Act Two introduces Kitty Finch-Gibbon (Kimberly Schraf), the fiercely principled, Old Guard conservative, chair of the Republican National Committee. Kitty tells Seaman the RNC considers him “stark, raving mad” and is willing to buy him off at any cost.
Under DC native Robert Egan’s exquisite direction, we have a cast with purpose, passion and pace. Original Music and sound design by Karl Lundeberg.
A brilliantly acerbic, politically explosive, outrageously hilarious piece of theater. Highly recommended.
Through December 3rd at the Atlas Center for the Performing Arts, 1333 H Street, NE, Washington, DC 20002. For tickets, special rates and discounts visit www.MosaicTheater.org or call the box office at 202.399.7993 ext. 2.
Jordan Wright
October 24, 2017
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Kathy Gordon as Wendy Darling and Alex Mills as Peter Pan ~ Photographer: Johnny Shryock Despite current accepted psychology ascribing ‘Peter Pan’ as a term for a man who refuses to accept adult responsibilities, we love this familiar tale of an English family of three children who fly off to a fantasy world where Peter and the fairy princess Tinkerbell reside in Neverland – a place of rip-roaring adventure populated by dastardly pirates, beautiful mermaids and motherless boys. Veteran of numerous Synetic productions, the chameleonic actor, Alex Mills, plays Peter to Ana Tsikurishvili’s lovable Tinkerbell. Ryan Sellers, who recently gave a formidable performance in Synetic’s The Mark of Cain plays Hook with panache satirizing Trump when he’s threatening the boys. Zana Gankhuyag is Peter’s mute Shadow – a fully developed role that shows off Gankhuyag’s incredible physicality.
Director Paata Tsikurishvili conceives Peter as a symbol for man’s desire to stave off aging. As he points out in the Playbill, “Everyone from the characters in Greek mythology to the Knights of the Round Table to Indiana Jones – they have all sought the kind of immortality which Peter Pan so effortlessly and carelessly displays and takes for granted in his playful rejection of the real world.” Echoing that theory, the play opens with a dark scene in the graveyard where Peter mourns the death of his sister. Thankfully, we needn’t dwell on a deeper meaning to revel this swashbuckling tale of an adventurous lad and his followers.
 Ryan Sellers (Captain Hook), Tori Bertocci (Starkey), Nathan Weinberger (Smee – top right) ~ Photographer: Johnny Shryock When Peter takes the Darling children the island of Neverland, Wendy (Kathy Gordon) becomes mother to Peter’s crew of Lost Boys who ride unicycles animal heads. Her brothers, Michael (Scott Whalen) and John (Thomas Beheler), join the motley group in their fight against the evil Captain Hook and his band of ne’er-do-wells. Nathan Weinberger plays Smee with a comically distended belly wrapped in stripes. Smee’s explanation for Peter’s eternal youth, “a healthy diet and yoga.” Peter’s explanation for his youthfulness, “Worrying takes the fun out of everything!” Sage advice.
 Kathy Gordon as Wendy Darling and Ryan Sellers as Captain Hook ~ Photographer: Johnny Shryock As you’d expect Choreographer Irina Tsikurishvili gives the troupe plenty to work with plunging us headlong into a fantasy world filled with high-flying acrobatics and crackling good swordfights masterfully co-choreographed by Vato Tsikurishvili. (Yes, it’s a family affair.) She aims to please with a rousing, River Dance style Irish reel to celebrate Wendy’s arrival, another from the Roaring 20’s and a dance for the pirate’s duel with Peter and his Shadow.
Fabulous costumes, especially Tinkerbell’s multi-colored LED lit fairy frock including glittery swimsuits on androgynous mermaids, by Kendra Rai. Colorful dialogue from Captain Hook’s smarmy crew will have your kids talking like a pirate is by the play’s adaptor, Ed Monk. My 8-year old seat neighbor was blown away by the spectacular swordplay.
 Lost Kids Dancing (from left to right) Thomas Beheler (John Darling), Scott Whalen (Michael Darling), Nate Shelton (Nibs), Anna Lynch (Slightly) ~ Photographer: Johnny Shryock Highly recommended for all ages.
Through November 19th at Synetic Theater, 1800 South Bell Street, Arlington in Crystal City. For tickets and information call 1 800 494-8497 or visit www.synetictheater.org.
Jordan Wright
October 23, 2017
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Mario Font as Vanya and Lorraine Bouchard as Masha ~ Photos by: Keith Waters In playwright Christopher Durang’s Tony Award-winning comedy Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, characters and themes from Chekhov are resurrected in a Bucks County, PA farmhouse. Sonia (Lorraine Bouchard) and Vanya (Mario Font), have been caretakers to their ailing actor/professor parents for fifteen years and know no other life than their childhood home – a remote farmhouse with a view to their beloved pond and cherry orchard. The two reclusive siblings include Sonia, a melancholy spinster with slim marital prospects and Vanya, who has not worked out his future (nor his sexual identity) either. When the last of their parents dies, the two must confront their unknowable future and reconcile the sacrifices they have made to their parents.
 : Marilyn Pifer as Cassandra and Mario Font as Vanya – Photos by: Keith Waters Their flighty housekeeper, Cassandra (Marilyn Pifer), a self-proclaimed seer fond of reciting grim snippets from Greek tragedies, warns the siblings to beware of many things – especially a character oddly named ‘Hootie Pie’ – who she predicts will upend their comfortable existence. Despite their doubts the siblings admit that some of her forecasts have actually come to pass – others not so much.
The set-up is hilarious and factors in their successful sister, Masha (Carol Preston), a Hollywood film star and five-time married cougar who soon arrives for the weekend with her young studly beau, Spike (John Paul Odle), aka ‘Vlad’, yet another Chekhov reference. Amid much canoodling with Spike, Masha tells them she can no longer continue to underwrite the expenses of maintaining the family home. Throwing a wrench into the evening before it begins, she reveals she has put their house on the market and they must make arrangements to leave. But first she insists they accompany her to a neighbor’s costume party that night at the former home of Dorothy Parker, where they will go as entourage dwarves to her Snow White and Spike’s sexy Prince. She tells them their costumes have been arranged by her assistant, Hootie Pie.
Meanwhile, Spike meets Nina (Hannah-Lee Grothaus), a neighbor’s pretty niece, and Masha’s claws come out. The aging actress’ fierce jealousies and cruel insults to Sonia, leave Vanya to put out the family fires.
 : (Back) Carol Preston as Masha, John Paul Odle as Spike, (Front) Hannah-Lee Grothaus as Nina, Mario Font as Vanya, Lorraine Bouchard as Sonia and Marilyn Pifer as Cassandra ~ Photos by: Keith Waters References to known locations in Bucks County, a writer/theater community within commuting distance of New York City, will delight and amuse those familiar with its history and famous denizens. I got a chuckle from a reference to the New Hope Wawa, the only spot open after 6pm for miles around. (My family frequented that very convenience store for over 50 years as their source for emergency groceries.)
Director Howard Kurtz does his best to pull this lifeless production together, but it never congeals, despite its humorously drawn characters, hilarious one-liners and Vanya’s rousing diatribe on Spike’s addiction to modern technology. “Our lives are all disconnected,” he howls. And though the cast individually have their moments, there is no cohesion between the actors and the sense that everyone is acting in a different play, on varying levels of intensity, undercuts its success. Indeed, the whole does not amount to the sum of its parts.
Through November 11th at The Little Theatre of Alexandria, 600 Wolfe Street. For tickets and information call the box office at 703 683-0496 or visit www.thelittletheatre.com
Jordan Wright
October 20, 2017
Special to The Alexandria Times
 (l-r) Sara Barker (Emilie), Brit Herring (Voltaire) ~ Photo credit: DJ Corey Photography The story of Émilie, La Marquise du Châtelet, a woman of science lightyears ahead of her time, is yet another thrilling play by Lauren Gunderson, the most-produced living playwright in America this season. It’s an intellectually-minded comic drama that delivers both wit and passion in spades. Based on the true story of the noted physicist and her decades-long collaboration with Voltaire, the 18th C poet, historian, and political rabble rouser, it appeals to an audience longing for representations of women of substance – especially those pioneers of science who fought hard for recognition in a male-dominated society. The latest to have been brought to our attention is Katherine Johnson, the African-American mathematician whose story was depicted in the Oscar-nominated movie, Hidden Figures.
 (l-r) Lisa Hodsoll (Madam), Billie Krishawn (Soubrette), Sara Barker (Emilie), Steve Lebens (Gentleman) ~ Photo credit: DJ Corey Photography In the role of a lifetime Sara Barker as Émilie provides us with a breathtaking, woman-in-full performance. Barker’s uncanny ability to get into the skin of the famed scientist and author is nothing less than spectacular. In defending the Marquise’s theory, a departure from Newton’s original, ‘Force, Motion, Mass Squared’ (“The squaring adds Life,” she concludes), Barker more than adopts Émilie’s brain, she appears to viscerally inhabit it.
In this plot, Émilie is eloquently matched by Voltaire, a mercurial romantic with an egotistical intellect, played admirably by Brit Herring. Together they form an alliance of ideas, “You’re a stunning woman, and an impressive man,” he tells her backhandedly. Until, ultimately, when she proves she is the true scientist of the two, he defames her, portraying her to the men of the Academy of Sciences as an insignificant female dilettante.
 (l-r) Billie Krishawn (Soubrette), Sara Barker (Emilie), Brit Herring (Voltaire) ~ Photo credit: DJ Corey Photography Director Rick Hammerly has Émilie keeping score of both her scholarly and romantic successes on framed panels of glass. She is fiercely competitive! When she wins an argument, or one-ups Voltaire, she makes white chalk marks to indicate her triumphs. Other furnishings combine 18th century elegance, like a curved leg writing desk and sparkling crystal chandelier, with modern day chrome and Lucite used in a madcap scene of musical chairs. Female actors wear corsets and paniers with denim jeans to parallel modern day misogyny. Especially noteworthy is Joseph R. Walls dramatic lighting and Frank DiSalvo Jr.’s sound design incorporating period music and striking sound effects.
Gunderson uses hilarity to depict their quixotic love scenes as when Voltaire aims to distract her with words of love. “Be my muse,” he implores. “Stop wooing, I can’t think,” she replies.
If I gave out stars (which as you know I don’t), this one would have five! Go!
With Lisa Hodsoll as Madam, Billie Krishawn as Soubrette, and Steve Lebens as Gentleman.
Through November 12th at Gunston Arts Center, Theatre Two – 2700 South Lang Street, Arlington, VA 22206. For tickets and information call 703 418.4808 or go online at www.AvantBard.org/tickets
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