Ryan Maxwell News

On Sunday, November 5, The Theatre Lab School of the Dramatic Arts hosted the 25th Anniversary Cabaret Dinner + Auction, the premiere event of the organization's milestone year. Held for the first time at the Ritz Carlton Washington, this year's Cabaret brought together around 500 artists, supporters, and friends of The Theatre Lab to enjoy great food and entertainment, and raise money to support educational programs. Through the generosity of guests, the evening raised more than $325,000 to bring the transformational power of theatre education to low-income children and teens, incarcerated and at-risk youth, homeless women in recovery, LGBTQ teens, older adults, wounded veterans, and more.

Today's subjects Britney Coleman and Tim Rogan are currently living their theatre lives at Arena Stage performing in one of the golden age of Broadway's more underrated musicals, The Pajama Game. They are playing the roles of Babe Williams and Sid Sorokin, respectively. The production runs through December 24th.

It's been one year since the bomb. Noah and her ragtag group of misfits have managed to survive-- barely. But when a stranger breaches the safety of their bunker, survival alone won't be enough.

Flying V has become the premiere forum for stage fights in the DC area, and the creativity in their 'Flying V Fights' series has never been more awesome or delightful. This year's entry, 'The Secret History of the Unknown World,' sees co-directors (and co-founders) Jason Schlafstein and Jonathan Ezra Rubin presiding over an evening of mayhem devoted to the bizarre, alternative worlds that have obsessed us on page and on film over 100 years.

Over the past week this column featured two remarkable ladies named Tina Ghandchilar and Julie Dixon. They are currently living their theatre lives as part of a production of Chess at The Theatre Lab School of the Performing Arts. The show opens this evening and runs through May 6th. Now it's time to feature one of the male leads.

Today's subject, Julie Dixon, is currently living her theatre life onstage at the Theatre Lab School of the Dramatic Arts where she will be opening in the pop rock musical Chess. The production plays this weekend through May 6th.

Today's subject Tina Ghandchilar is currently living her theatre life in the most stoked way possible. She is currently preparing to star as Florence in Chess at The Theatre Lab School for the Dramatic Arts, which, in my opinion, is the best arts in education institution in DC. The production runs from April 27th through May 6th.

Just in time for those winter, presidential inaugural blues, Pinky Swear Productions comes along offering the ultimate rock-scream therapy session with Lizzie, a musical dedicated to America's most famous real-life axe-murderer. Not for the faint-of heart, this is a musical that by rights should be featured in this Saturday's women's march, a reminder that women are perfectly capable of getting in their digs (or whacks, as the case may be) when pushed to the edge.

On an August morning in 1892, in a small town in Massachusetts, Andrew and Abby Borden were brutally murdered in their home with an axe. Their daughter, Lizzie, was tried and acquitted for the crime and in the process captured the morbid fascination of the entire nation. Created by Steven Cheslik-DeMeyer, Tim Maner, and Alan Stevens Hewitt, LIZZIE is a tale of sex, rage, and murder told by Lizzie, her sister Emma, her friend Alice Russell, and her maid Bridget Sullivan-all set to a pounding riot grrrl beat.

Somewhere between the ancient rituals of our pagan ancestors and the tacky office holiday party you attended last night lurks an answer to the question that haunts your dreams: 'How did I get here?'

It is timely to have a show that focuses like a laser on the complex psychology of young women, as they make their first awkward steps into adulthood. Mosaic Theater's commitment to confronting our deepest community issues continues with Jennifer Nelson's stellar production of Milk Like Sugar, Kirsten Greenidge's Obie-award winning drama about teenage girls navigating their way through their high school years, the most treacherous of all.

Hot on the heels of the record-breaking, critically hailed Satchmo at the Waldorf, Mosaic Theater Company of DC's Season Two continues with Kirsten Greenidge's riotous, Obie Award-winning MILK LIKE SUGAR (November 2 - 27, 2016), under the direction of Mosaic Theater's Jennifer L. Nelson (The Gospel of Lovingkindness). The play, Mosaic's second DC premiere this season, is a rousing story about young women coming of age in a time when issues of acceptance, mentorship, and materialism challenge the dreams and ambitious of so many teens. It is the first of three plays in Mosaic's 2016-17 season to highlight issues affecting young urban teens and millennials, to be followed by the DC premiere of Philip Dawkins' intergenerational LGBTQ comedy Charm, and the world premiere of Tearrance Arvelle Chisholm's Hooded: Or Being Black for Dummies.

LOVE'S LABEERS LOST is Shakespeare in a frat house in a bar. Director Sara Bickler has always wanted to direct Shakespeare's LOVE'S LABOURS LOST, a little produced comedy without a happy ending.

Rorschach Theatre often tackles strange and sometimes difficult productions, and A BID TO SAVE THE WORLD fits right in with that lineup. My mind hurts nicely from all the thinking in what is a surprisingly cerebral experience. Written by Erin Bregman and directed by Lee Liebeskind, the play explores death and saving the world with a light hand and an intellectual cudgel. 

The Kennedy Center hosts its 15th annual Page-to-Stage New Play Festival from Today, September 3 to Monday, September 5, 2016, featuring more than 50 theaters from the D.C. metropolitan area, all with a mission to produce and support new work.

The Kennedy Center hosts its 15th annual Page-to-Stage New Play Festival from Saturday, September 3 to Monday, September 5, 2016, featuring more than 50 theaters from the D.C. metropolitan area, all with a mission to produce and support new work.

Coping, produced by Green Spark Productions, opened last night to rave responses as part of the Capital Fringe Festival. 

The Welders-Washington's only playwrights' collective devoted exclusively to developing and producing new work-have launched their fifth production. Transmission, by Gwydion Suilebhan, opens April 30, 2016 at the Atlas Performing Arts Center.

Flying V has carved out a niche in the DC theater scene by producing unabashedly joyful, adventurous and original material.  Their latest offering, the rock musical You, or whatever I can get, is a creation of an ensemble that is tight, talented, and as ready for prime time as it gets.

The announcement that Lin-Manuel Miranda has composed music for the new STAR WARS movie has inspired two comic hashtags.