Folger Theatre’s Metamorphoses Is a Wild and Wacky Trip
Folger Shakespeare Theatre Jordan Wright May 16, 2024 Special to The Zebra
The Water Nymph (Miss Kitty) introduces us to the mythical tales of Ovid (Photo/Brittany Diliberto)
Playwright Mary Zimmerman is a national treasure. With two productions currently running in DC theaters and last year’s Helen Hayes Award-winning production of The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci at the Shakespeare Theatre Company, her reputation in our area is firmly cemented. I’ll see anything with her name on it. You should too.
In Metamorphoses Zimmerman uses stories from David Slavitt’s translation of the Latin poet Ovid’s masterpiece written in 8 A.D. to form the foundation of this dramedy that puts these ancient myths in modern context describing the history of the world in a hilariously topsy-turvy vision of the classic.
Hunger (Yesenia Islesias, left) breathes spirit into Erysichthon (Gerrad Alex Taylor) (Photo/Brittany Diliberto)
Most of the vignettes here are the familiar cautionary tales of greed, lust, incest…oh let’s just proffer the seven deadly sins and call it a day. Under Director Psalmayene 24’s singularly creative interpretation we find an all-Black ensemble playing multiple parts in a flurry of costume changes to express the multiple roles each actor portrays within the individual vignettes.
Psalmayene has conjured up one of the most explosive openings seen on DC stages. It is so stunning that the audience goes utterly silent. Led by the Water Nymph (Miss Kitty) the entourage parades through the center aisle, tribal dancing, whirling, summoning the Gods with African music as they arrive onstage. There they undergo an a sort of transmogrification – as captured slaves undergoing the Middle Passage from their ancestral lands. Tossed by a tempest at sea, their journey reflects the pain and degradation of a slave market. From that dramatic unveiling, our storytellers find themselves in dire circumstances humorously expressed through costume, character and morphing appearance. Because the actors play multiple parts, I found it tricky to puzzle out who played which character. That’s a testimonial to the extraordinary costume design by Mika Eubanks, who hascreated here some of the most beautiful, zany, over-the-top and imaginative costumes I’ve seen all year.
Cast sings “King Fisher” song in Folger Theatre’s staging of Metamorphoses. Pictured top: DeJeanette Horne and Billie Krishawn; bottom, left to right: Manu Kumasi, Kalen Robinson, and Yesenia Iglesias. (Photo/Brittany Diliberto)
Imagine the goddess, Iris, sporting a pink Afro with a frilly rainbow-hued and ruffled tutu – another character super fly in full-on glittering gold and white and the morphing of Alcyone (Renee Elizabeth Wilson) who with her beloved husband take the form of birds, reflecting the well-known phrase ‘halcyon days”.
There’s a lot to be said for brevity when it comes to complex themes of love and loss and in these stories, the objective is clear. In each piece we meet the hapless cast of characters and learn of the hot mess they’ve gotten themselves into challenged and complicated by the muse or god positioned on high – in this case upon the balcony. The frailties and passions of mere mortals are highlighted, while the gods, busy spewing their edicts and curses, become fodder for ridicule with the moral of the story revealed after each vision quest.
Narcissus (Gerrad Alex Taylor) accepts a flower from the Water Nymph (Miss Kitty) (Photo/Brittany Diliberto)
The choice of Midas (brilliantly played by Jon Hudson Odom) as the opening myth, is a good one, since we all know the tale of the greedy king who wished everything he touched turned to gold unfortunately that included most his beloved daughter (Kalen Robinson). Clad in a green velvet jacket and crown, Midas rues the day he threw over his daughter for the golden touch and goes on a mission to undo the terrible curse. Odom, totally tricked out, returns as Orpheus busting Motown moves to James Brown’s “Get Up (I Feel Like Being a Sex Machine)” and Michael Jackson’s “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’”. And, boom! We are laughing our tailfeathers off.
Metamorphoses shows that it is possible to speak of enigmatic things when they are creatively and hilariously interpreted and passionately performed by an ensemble of such high calibre.
Lighting Designer William K. D’Eugenio and Scenic Designer Lawrence E. Moten III have crucial tasks since there are no set changes and no curtains to draw. Along with Sound Designer and Composer Nick Tha 1DA Hernandez, ambiance is key to support the stories. And because the wigs and hair designs are so over the top, I’d be remiss if I didn’t give a shout out to Designer Rueben D. Echoles.
Highly recommended!
The cast of Mary Zimmerman’s Metamorphoses (Photo/Brittany Diliberto)
With Edwin Brown as Third Man: Phaeton and others; Dejeanette Horne as First Man: Zeus and others; Renea S. Brown as Third Woman: Myrrha and others; Yesenia Iglesias as First Woman: Aphrodite and others; Billie Krishawn as Second Woman: Eurydice and others; Manu Kumasi as Fourth Man: Vertumnus and others; Gerrad Alex Taylor as Fifth Man: Bacchus and others.
Artistic Director, Karen Ann Daniels; Choreographer, Tony Thomas; Original Composer, Willy Schwarz; Sound Designer, Nick Tha 1DA Henrnandez; Props Designer Deb Thomas; Dramaturg, Faedra Chatard Carpenter PhD.
Through June 16th at the Folger Theatre, Folger Shakespeare Library, 201 East Capitol Street, SE, Washington, DC – For tickets and information visit www.folger.edu or call the box office at 202 544-7007.
The Washington National Opera’s Ending for Puccini’s Turandot Shines with a Multinational Cast at The Kennedy Center
Turandot The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Jordan Wright May 15, 2024
Ewa Płonka (Photo/Cory Weaver)
Turandot, the Washington National Opera’s final production for this season, opened on its glittering ‘Gala Night’. For those of you who despair of theatregoers sporting jeans and backpacks, this would have been your night to shine. Elegantly gowned, bejeweled and tuxedoed were the opera aficionados who transported us back to the halcyon days when Jacqueline Kennedy envisioned the nation’s most prestigious cultural center beside the Potomac River and audiences arrived in all their splendor.
This production presented us with an exciting new ending for this iconic Puccini opera, written yet unfinished before his untimely death. It has been 100 years since his demise and a collaboration between WNO General Director, Timothy O’Leary and WNO Artistic Director, Francesca Zambello, selected a lyricist and composer to replace the ending that had been written by Franco Alfano 100 years ago. That premiere was in 1926 at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan under the baton of the great Toscanini.
Yonghoon Lee (Calaf) Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha (Liù) (Photo/Cory Weaver)
This new ending was written by playwright/screenwriter Susan Soon He Stanton (HBO’s Succession) along with composer Christopher Tin (two-time Grammy winner of concert and media music) who amplified the score creating the final twenty minutes of new music and employing the “axe motif” – a series of five chords that sound like the executioner’s axe falling on Turandot’s suitor and that reoccurs throughout the opera.
This massive production has been an enormous undertaking with an ensemble consisting of 60 adults, 20 youth, 10 dancers, 10 supernumeraries, 73 musicians, 14 banda, two conductors, 40 stagehands, seven in wig and makeup – 275 plus staff backstage. The cast itself is multinational.
A brief synopsis of the story features Turandot, a bloodthirsty Chinese princess, whose ancestor was kidnapped, raped and murdered by a stranger. This becomes the raison d’être for her murderous campaign to challenge each of her suitors to answer three questions correctly in order to win her hand. (One wonders if she doesn’t change the answers to suit her desires.) In any case, if they do not answer satisfactorily, it’s off with their heads. A three-story guillotine is brought onstage to emphasize her barbaric desires.
Scene from WNO Turandot (Photo/Cory Weaver)
After a number of suitors are summarily dispatched for their inaccurate responses, along comes Prince Calaf, a reckless youth who is determined against all odds and pleadings from his father, the exiled king Timur, Liù the sweet slave girl who secretly loves him, and the three ministers to give up his quest. But, oh no, our man Calaf ignores all warnings as he is guided only by his desire to win the hand of Turandot. As a story aiming to reflect a more modern China, Set Designer Wilson Chin, gives us a look straight out of Germany’s Brutalist architecture with three floors of metal scaffolding where the refugees and abandoned retinues watch the hideous acts unfold.
Polish soprano Ewa Plonka conjures Turandot’s evil intentions belting out her ferocity like a fire-breathing dragon in a multi-layered performance against the softer-voiced tenor Yonghoon Lee as the feckless young Calaf. Yet it’s the passionately ardent Liù performed by soprano Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha’s in her richly transcendent mellifluous voice, that provide the beauty amid the horror. The three ministers, formerly known as Ping, Pang and Pong, have been appropriately renamed as Majordomo (Ethan Vincent), Majordomo (Sahel Salam), and Head Chef Jonathan Pierce Rhodes). Emperor Altoum is Turandot’s father and is played by Neil Shicoff. Peixin Chen plays Timur, Calaf’s father. You will be comforted by the Disneyesque happy ending as Turandot comes to her senses and Calaf wins her heart, although after enduring the horrors of Turandot’s reign, the denouement is a hard pill to swallow.
Neil Shicoff (Emperor Altoum) (Photo/Cory Weaver)
Directed by Francesca Zambello, the evening’s performance, a co-production with the WNO, Opèra de Montrèal and Dallas Opera, was dedicated to Washington’s own visionary philanthropist, David M. Rubenstein, who after a fourteen-year leadership leaves an inspiring legacy on the future of the WNO.
With the WNO’s Opera Chorus, Children’s Chorus and Corps Dancers, it also stars Le Bu as Mandarin and soprano Margorie Owens as an alternate in the role of Turandot and tenor Jonathan Burton as an alternate in the role of Calaf.
Speranza Scappucci and Aaron Breid conduct; Choreographer Kanji Segawa; Costume Designer Linda Cho; Lighting Designer Amith Chandrashaker; Projection Designer S. Katy Tucker; Dramaturg Kelley Rourke, and Associate Director Anna Maria Bruzzese.
A triumph for this marvelous cast and creative team.
Ewa Płonka (Turandot) and Yonghoon Lee (Calaf) (Photo/Cory Weaver)
Through May 25 at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, 2700 F Street, NW, Washington, DC 20566. For tickets and information call the box office at 202 467-4600 or visit Kennedy-Center.org.
Corteo Features an Elegant Victorian Vibe with All the Dazzling Acrobatics You Have Come to Expect from Cirque du Soleil
Corteo at Eagle Bank Arena Jordan Wright May 18, 2024 Special to The Zebra
(Photo/Maja Prgomet)
I’ve been covering Cirque du Soleil for twelve years when they first came to the DC Metropolitan area with Amaluna at National Harbor. Since then, all their productions have been in a massive tent in Tysons II. Last night they brought Corteo to the Eagle Bank Arena at George Mason University. Instead of their iconic basketball games , the arena was constructed to fit a theatre-in-the-round that utilized around half of the 10,000 seat arena which was filled to capacity.
Corteo which means cortege in Italian is a joyful procession, a festive parade imagined by a clown. The costumes and set design are of the Art Nouveau period and as such are quite charming and elegant. Quite different from the more recent productions which are enormous and with all the activities onstage, the innumerable spotlights and large ensemble can often be confusing and distracting. It opens with the central character of the hapless clown getting his wings from an angel who teaches him how to fly heavenward. Beautiful angels two-stories high factor a great deal in the entire production. The spoken words are partly in English, partly in Italian and partly in French with the foreign languages using a vocabulary easy to understand.
(Photo/Maja Prgomet)
The clown pictures his funeral taking place in a carnival atmosphere, watched over by angels. Juxtaposing the large with the small, the ridiculous with the tragic, the magic of perfection with the charm of imperfection, the show focusses on the strength and fragility of the clown, as well as his wisdom and kindness.
The show combines the actor’s passion with the acrobat’s grace and power to plunge the audience into a fantasy world of silliness and spontaneity in a mysterious space between heaven and hell. It harkens back to the olden days of circuses and pantomimes, hilarious sketches and extraordinary feats of daring.
Pillow fights on trampolines disguised as brass beds evoke the period as does the music of the era with the accordion being prominent and an oompah band visible towards the rear of the stage and musicians and singers in globe-lit boxes on either side of the stage.
(Photo/Maja Prgomet)
There are crazy-funny comedy sketches – one of two Scotsmen golfers in their plus fours hitting a ‘live ball’ whose head pops up from beneath the stage while teasing the duffers who thankfully never manage to hit the ‘ball’. Many of the characters sport satin Pierrot harlequin costumes or big bloomers echoing the period. The Maestro in red satin cutaway jacket and black top hat whistles Mozart. In one juggling scene dozens of rubber chicken fall from the rafters, in another, gypsies compete in a daredevil parallel bars competition. There are countless scenes of stunning beauty and extraordinary athleticism – one such features a tiny lady appearing to be in a snow globe. Jugglers and aerialists feature prominently with all acts backed by a beautifully melodic musical score. I was particularly drawn to two small performers enacting Romeo and Juliet in a Punch and Judy routine within a scaled down Teatro Intimo. A bicycle-riding highwire act and gorgeous lady acrobats on chandeliers had us gasping.
The creativity in all of Cirque’s shows is boundless, although I found that, though smaller in scale to what we have been accustomed to with Cirque in the Grand Chapiteau, Corteo was more intimate and elegant, and just as mind-blowing as any of the dozen or so productions I had seen in the past.
(Photo/Maja Prgomet)
Corteo is as beautiful as it is thrilling and endearing at the same time. With set curtains inspired by the Eiffel Tower and gorgeous hand-painted central curtains, the ambiance is one of immersive time travel.
Directed by Daniele Finzi Pasca, this one will forever be one of my all-time favorites.
Highly recommended!!!
At the Eagle Bank Arena, 4500 Patriot Circle, Fairfax, VA 22030
Performance Schedule – May 17th at 7pm, May 18th at 3pm and 7pm, May 19th at 1pm, and May 25th at 3pm and 7pm. Tickets at www.CirrqueduSoleil.com/Corteo
Rose: You Are Who You Eat Where: Woolly Mammoth
When: June 5 – June 23
Find more information at www.WoollyMammoth.net
Metamorphoses Where: Folger Shakespeare Theatre
When: Now through June 16
Find more information at www.Folger.edu
Long Way Down Where: Olney Theatre Center
When: Now through June 23
Find more information at www.OlneyTheatre.org
Image via the Kennedy Center
Bye Bye Birdie Kennedy Center
June 7 – June 15
Find more information at www.Kennedy-Center.org
The Magic Matchbox Flute Where: Shakespeare Theatre Company
When: Now through June 16
Find more information at www.ShakespeareTheatre.org
Postcards from Ihatov Where: 1stStage
When: June 6 – June 23
Find more information at www.1stStage.org
Letters to Kamala and Dandelion Peace Where: Voices Festival Productions – at Universalist National Memorial Church
When: June 8 – June 21
Find more information at www.TicketTailor.com
Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Musical Where: Adventure Theatre
When: June 21 – August 19
Find more information at www.AdventureTheatre-mtc.org
Image via Roundhouse Teatre
Top Dog/Underdog Where: Roundhouse Teatre
When: Now through June 23
Find more information at www.RoundhouseTheatre.org
The Elephant in theRoom Where: Keegan Theatre
When: June 1 – June 23
Find more information at www.KeeganTheatre.com
The Migration
Where: Arena Stage
When: June 7 – July 18
Find more information atwww.ArenaStage.org
The Minutes Where: Providence Players of Fairfax When: June 7 – June 22
Find more information at www.ProvidencePlayers.org
Miss Nelson is Missing
Miss Nelson is Missing Where Imagination Stage
When June 20 – August 10
Find more information at www.ImaginationStage.org
The Haymaker’s Wife Where: Theatre J
When: June 8 – June 25
Find more information at www.TheatreJ.org
Rent Where: Dominion Stage
When: June 7 – June 22
Find more information at www.DominionStage
American Psycho Where: Monumental Theatre Company
When: June 28 – July 21
Find more information at www.App.Arts-People.com
The Drowsy Chaperone Where: Workhouse Arts Center
When: Now through June 23
Find more information at www.WorkhouseArts.org
Dixie’s Tupperware Party Brings Wild and Crazy Southern Schtick to the Kennedy Center
Dixie’s Tupperware Party John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Jordan Wright May 15, 2024
Yes, Dixie Longate is a real person who has been selling Tupperware for 22 years. I need to put that out there because initially I was unsure if what I was seeing was a person or a character – definitely a bit of both. Ms. Dixie has won countless sales awards in no small part due to her outrageously hilarious and super salty brand of humor and earnestly flippant pep talks. To join her party be prepared to be charmed, included (parts are interactive) and doubled over with laughter. Dixie is the best friend and soulmate you were not entirely sure you needed, but how on earth did you reach adulthood without her detailed instructions on relationships? Her prescription (maybe I should call it “The Gospel According to Dixie”) for a successful life offers tough love, Tupperware and sex advice – all delivered tongue-in-cheek.
Strutting the stage in ruby red high heels and tossing out advice like tabs from a Pez dispenser, this Mobile, Alabama gal chides the audience while doling out her own life story. In her saucy red gingham dress with candy cane striped skirt festooned with bows and topped ever so sweetly with a retro cherry-print apron, this feisty six-foot plus gal doles out platitudes and life lessons the audience laps up like kittens to a bowl of sweet milk. How can you not love a gal sporting a bouffant hairdo that’s as close to God as a rattail comb can achieve? For some reason I began to desperately crave a cherry Coke, fried green tomatoes and a Moon Pie.
Image via the Kennedy Center
If you don’t get the vapors from her non-stop, double entendre repartee, you’ll learn a lot about how Tupperware relates to Life as she regales you with stories of prison and her trailer park background before she found her muse, Brownie Wise, the housewife founder of Tupperware in-home parties who changed the world of business for women everywhere. That part is true. As Dixie tells it, “I have three kids – Wynona, Dwayne and Absorbine, Jr. and 3 ex-husbands. All of ‘em have somehow died, but I ain’t crying about it. I’m way too busy traveling all over the place bringing creative food storage solutions to your town.”
Dixie loves her gays and they love her back. She calls them her “homosectionals” – the rest of us are lovingly referred to as “hookers” – and likes to challenge the audience to interactive games, bringing a select few onstage while dispensing Southern schtick. There were moments when I was entirely prepared to see Baltimore filmmaker John Waters pop out from behind the curtain with the late actor “Divine”. Ah, well, Miss Dixie is a truly pretty Southern gal – just don’t tell John I said that.
Be sure to see Dixie in her wild and crazy Tupperware World. It’s tons of fun!
Image via the Kennedy Center
By Kris Andersson; Directed by Patrick Richwood; with Lighting Design by Richard Winkler and Sound Design by Christopher K. Bond.
Through June 2nd at The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in the Family Theatre, 2700 F Street, NW, Washington, DC 20566. For tickets and information call the box office at 202 467-4600 or visit www.Kennedy-Center.org.
The Psychedelic Age of Aquarius Shines with “Hair” at Signature Theatre
Hair Signature Theatre Jordan Wright April 28, 2024 Special to The Zebra
Peace signs, African beads, bellbottoms, tie dyed t-shirts, dashikis and fringe jackets. Sound familiar? If not, you were born long after the Peace Movement and hippie culture radicalized the American landscape. Created organically as a result of Nixon and Reagan politics and the Vietnam war, and framed by marijuana, LSD and peyote, this movement defined the late 60’s and early 70’s spreading out from California (doesn’t everything?) through the heartland to the East Coast. Communal living and free love, before the age of AIDS, generated a free and open spirit that saw a multitude of campus protests, countrywide activism, the start of the new women’s movement and the ascension of Black Power.
Olivia Puckett (Sheila), Jordan Dobson (Claude), and Mason Reeves (Berger) (Photo/Christopher Mueller)
The world was changing, and it was not driven by political insiders, but by student activists, American youth and the mood of a country fed up with the graphic nightly broadcasting of the Vietnam war. This political shift was emblematic of the nation’s divisions. Three men caught this shift in the mood of the country. They were Gerome Ragni, James Rado and Galt Macdermot who collaborated on one of the first rock musicals ever written in the age of Aquarius and they called it Hair to reflect the polarization of the long-haired youth and the straight, predominantly White ruling culture. This radical experiment in musical theatre elevated the movement and gave it a beautiful and complex voice. I first saw it in the mid-60’s at Joseph Papp’s New York Shakespeare Festival Theatre on a small stage and it was magical – encapsulating everything the counter culture movement was trying to say and the political machine it was up against.
Director Matthew Gardiner has seized the vibe and faithfully respected its original purpose. As an interactive piece that often breaks the fourth wall, it allows the audience to share the emotions and passions of its characters – fifteen strong-minded youths with racially diverse middle-class backgrounds, living together – and not always getting by – but always getting high.
The cast of HAIR at Signature Theatre (Photo/Christopher Mueller)
Forty numbers give voice to the relevant interests of American youth – fear of 1-A draft status, fascination with the British Invasion “Manchester England”, sex, Aretha, Hendrix, festivals and love-ins, East Indian culture and flower power. It’s what’s happening, baby. Even if you didn’t live it, it’s resurgence echoes in the current Boho fashion style with macrame and peace signs. Wait! Where’s my mood ring? Even Margaret Mead makes an appearance to investigate the scene – for anthropological research, of course.
Backgrounded with video projections of the era, and a kick-ass 9-piece band conducted by Angie Benson, this production will catapult you to a moment in time that revolutionized music, art, politics and culture – a time when there were bad trips and good times. A time of activism, questionable wars and the malaise of youth happening yet again on college campuses today.
Ashleigh King’s hyper-energetic choreography focusses on Dance, Dance, Dance with this multi-talented, hyper-exuberant ensemble. You can sense the cast is loving the atmosphere Gardiner has created for them to explore. Coupled with Paige Hathaway’s set design incorporating iconography of the period, it is a brave, exuberant and immersive experience.
Highly recommended!
Jordan Dobson (Claude) (Photo/Christopher Mueller)
With Jordan Dobson as Claude; Amanda Lee as Dionne; Mason Reeves as Berger; Noah Israel as Woof; Solomon Parker III as Hud; Olivia Puckett as Sheila; Nora Palka as Jeanie; Caroline Graham as Crissy; Jamie Goodson as Suzannah/Mother; Keenan McCarter as Steve/Father; Nolan Montgomery as Jonathan/Margaret Mead; Greg Twomey as Paul/Hubert; Savannah Blackwell as Lorrie; Patrick Leonardo Casimir as Walter; and Alex De Bard as Emmaretta.
Lighting by Jason Lyons; Sound Design by Eric Norris; Video Design by Patrick W. Lord; Wig Design by Anne Nesmith; Fight Choreographer Casey Kaleba; Resident Intimacy Consultant and Choreographer Chelsea Pace.
Through July 7, 2024 at Signature Theatre, 4200 Campbell Avenue, in Shirlington Village, Arlington, VA 22206. For tickets and information call the box office at 703 820-9771 or visit www.SigTheatre.org.
