Everything certainly isn’t wonderful at present. Whatever horrors the near future holds in store, one day it will have passed; then we’ll have to start rebuilding our relationships with people who have hurt us, or whom we have hurt, and tend to the long process of healing and forgiveness. Or not.

Keegan Theatre is offering a cautionary tale about how fraught this process is, with a quietly powerful offering of Chelsea Marcantel’s Everything Is Wonderful at their Church Street theater through October 5. The play had been previously staged five years earlier at Baltimore’s Everyman Theatre, but this is the DC premiere.

In a Western Pennsylvania Amish community, husband and wife Jacob and Esther have barely had time to mourn the deaths of their only two sons, Levi and Joshua, when at their door arrives Eric, the distracted city boy who drove into their buggy and killed them. Although he had been on a boozy four-day bender, he was legally sober at the time of the accident and ended up facing no charges. He’s guilt-ridden, seeking forgiveness, and wants to make atonement.

This opens a large can of worms, as Amish culture is very much focused on radical forgiveness, leaning on platitudes like the play’s title, which reads as superficial in the interest of moving on with their duty to God and the community and leaving the raw hurt, loss, and anguish to fester. Despite the obvious pain Eric’s presence is causing them, Jacob and Esther take him in, and he works, albeit incompetently, for his keep. Although he has to sleep in the barn due to the presence of their daughter Ruth, he has a seat at their dinner table.

Who doesn’t have a seat at their table is Miri (short for Miriam), their older daughter, who has returned home following the accident after being excommunicated from the community years ago. On arrival, she is not welcomed inside and has to eat her meals on the porch and sleep in the barn. The reason for her leaving is a story told mainly in flashback and involves the young man next door, Abram. When she realizes Abram is now courting her younger sister, the wide-eyed, dutifully innocent Ruth, she must confront her unresolved trauma. Her perspective is telling: “Forgiveness,” she notes, “is a shortcut to get around the messy parts.”

The power of Marcatel’s script lies between the lines in the tense silences. Under the family’s placidity and platitudes lie roiling seas, and when the facades crack, the play finds its most memorable moments. A harrowing scene involving Esther and a basket of eggs will linger long after the final bows, and the simultaneous climactic catharses evoke the heightened emotional crests of the great 20th-century dramas of O’Neill, Miller, et al.

Director Josh Sticklin keeps the steady, measured pace, letting the play find its own rhythm without feeling overlong. I will confess to initially struggling to follow the flashbacks, as they don’t particularly establish themselves in an earlier time or place, so I thought a few of them at first were just other scenes happening in the same timeline as the rest of the story. I eventually caught up.

The ensemble of six distinguishes itself in handling the challenging emotional material. Keegan co-founder Susan Marie Rhea and Michael McGovern, as the grieving mother and father, stand out, though Leah Packer’s Miri carries the show as the black sheep of the family, struggling to find herself outside the community she grew up in.

Ben Clark is deceptively winsome as Abram, giving hints of his dark undercurrents. As Ruth, Sasha Rosenbaum creates a tragic portrait of a naive young woman wrestling with her duty to God and the community, and the dawning recognition that she might not want to marry Abram, or anyone for that matter. Max Johnson, as the outsider Eric, creates a very effective portrait of a lost young man whose need for atonement might be a little too self-obsessed.

Sticklin also designed the set, rich and vibrant in detail and color, down to the quilt pattern coloring on the floor, dressed by Cindy Landrum Jacobs’ props and set dressing and warmed and cooled by Hailey LaRoe’s lighting and projections. Paris Francesca’s costuming effectively recreates the simple, unadorned Amish clothing, which contrasts sharply with Eric and Miri’s contemporary garb.

What getting back to some sense of normalcy will require from us may vary, but the potentials and pitfalls of radical forgiveness and the strengths and challenges of moving forward are on display on Church Street, and give us all a great deal to consider. Everything Is Wonderful will linger in your mind days after seeing it.

Running Time: Two hours and 30 minutes including one 15-minute intermission.

Everything Is Wonderful plays through October 5, 2025 (Thursdays to Saturdays at 8:00 pm, Sundays at 3:00 pm, and select Mondays and Wednesdays at 8:00 pm), at The Keegan Theatre, 1742 Church St NW, Washington, DC. Tickets are $55 ($44 for seniors and students) and available online.

Everything Is Wonderful
By Chelsea Marcantel
Directed by Josh Sticklin

CAST
Ben Clark (Abram), Max Johnson (Eric), Michael McGovern (Jacob), Leah Parker (Miri), Susan Marie Rhea (Esther), Sasha Rosenbaum (Ruth). Understudies: Adian Chapman, Millie Greenberg, John Henry Stamper, Martina Schabron.

PRODUCTION
Scenic Design: Josh Sticklin, Assistant Director: Jared H Graham, Dramaturg: Katrina Heil, Sound Designer: Tony Angelini, Costume Designer: Paris Francesca, Production Manager: Gabrielle Busch, Stage Manager: Emilie Knudsen, Fight & Intimacy Coordinator: Sierra Young, Lighting & Projection Designer: Hailey LaRoe, Props & Set Dressing: Cindy Landrum Jacobs, Dialect Coach: Zach Campion, Vocal Consultant: Brigid Wallace Harper, Assistant Stage Manager: Anahita Sepehri

SEE ALSO:
Keegan Theatre announces cast and team for ‘Everything Is Wonderful’ (news story, August 28, 2025)

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The British Players have imported the dramatic traditions of the UK to the Washington, DC, area for 60 years and are presenting their annual holiday pantomime to ex-pats and lovers of Brit culture. This year’s offering, Jack and the Beanstalk by Ben Crocker, strikes a pleasant balance of whimsy, fun, and tradition and runs through January 11 at the Kensington Town Hall, just off Connecticut Avenue, a few miles over the Maryland border.

All the requisite elements of panto are here. The Principal Boy-slash-Hero, typically played by a young woman (an engagingly, thigh-slappingly gung-ho Niranjali Amerasinghe as Jack), the Dame, typically played by a man (a busty Jonathan Kilgore as Jack’s mum), the Good Fairy (Rachel Schlaff), the baddie (Ian Swank as the Giant aided by Amanda Dullin-Jones as his henchperson Slimeball), the Principal Girl (Abigail Mitchell as Princess Demelza), the requisite animal (BP life peer Pauline Griller-Mitchell as both ends of the Pantomime Cow), the King (Robert Teachout), Simple Simon (Richard Jacobson), and a raft of supporting parts. As this is a community showcase, the ensemble swells to a full two dozen performers of all ages, plus musicians.

Are they aiming for high artistic achievement? Bloody heck no, they’re following the long-prescribed formula to an audience who knows exactly what to expect. Said audience all comes on on cue with their cheers for the good guys, boos for the villains, their “Oh no it isn’ts!” and “Look behind yous!” and unless the production is awful, they’re going to go home happy. And it’s far from it, so they do.

The ceremonies are kicked off on a high note with a charmingly clever breakdown of the panto conventions to the tune of “Tradition!” from Fiddler on the Roof. Indeed, more than a few popular songs and show tunes are imported into the script, either adapted for the play (Little Shop’s “Dentist” song now becomes “Be a Henchman!”) or left more or less untouched (“Money” from Cabaret, Abba’s “Take a Chance On Me,” Madonna’s “Material Girl,” etc.). The only song that didn’t quite work was the Giant’s rendition of Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On,” despite Ian Swank’s valiant effort.

Laura Andruski’s direction keeps things chugging along and makes good use of the extras so everyone gets their moment, Valerie Higgs’ musical direction is tasteful and not overpowering, Nancy Scales’ choreography is pleasant, and the technical aspects (Lily Pacuit’s set, Steve Deming’s lights, Matt Mills’ sound and projections, McKenna Kelly’s costumes, Cathy Dunn’s makeup and hair) all serve the story well.

I shouldn’t quibble, but it’s my job; I can’t help but feel that the show could use a little more pace, some editing/pruning of the songs may be in order, there were some volume issues despite body mics (a few performers were muffled by the band, or maybe it’s where I was sitting), and the generous forestage was underused (it’s a big room, the closer the better!). It’s opening week, so it’ll come around.

Running Time: Two hours and 15 minutes with one intermission.

Jack and the Beanstalk: A British Pantomime plays through January 11, 2025 (Friday at 8:00 pm, Saturdays at 7:30 pm, and Saturdays and Sundays at 2:00 pm), presented by the British Players performing at Kensington Town Hall, 3710 Mitchell St, Kensington, MD. Purchase tickets ($28, $15 for children, group discounts available) at the door, online, or by email to boxoffice@britishplayers.org.

COVID Safety: Masks are optional.

Jack and the Beanstalk by Ben Crocker
Directed by Laura W. Andruski
Produced by Lauren Pacuit and Michelle Hessel
Music Directed by Valerie A. Higgs
Choreographed by Nancy Scales Harry

CAST
Edena, the Eco Fairy: Rachel Schlaff
Slimeball: Amanda Dullin-Jones
Jack Trot: Niranjali Amerasinghe
Princess Demelza: Abigail Mitchell
King Bertram: Robert Teachout
Trumpet: Sarah Leembruggen
Dame Trot: Jonathan Kilgore
Simple Simon: Richard Jacobson
Daisy the Cow: Pauline Griller-Mitchell (Lisa Singleton in select performances)
Giant Blunderbore: Ian Swank
Sarge: Colin Davies
Cockroaches: Aidan Swank, AnnabellePrashani Scott, Gianna Somerville
Ensemble: Andrew Harasty, Emilia O’Connor, Lauren Pacuit, John Rocco, Natasha Scott, Lisa Singleton, Tristian Singleton, Jay Thaiyod, Aubrey Tingler, Rachel Waldstein

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Silver Spring Stage has been a local institution for more than half a century, performing in an atmospheric basement blackbox in the Woodmoor Shopping Center in Four Corners, and its latest offering is Colman Domingo’s family drama Dot, running through December 15.

As the Shealy family gathers in West Philadelphia for another Christmas, oldest daughter Shelly has been struggling to take care of her aging mother Dotty (a sweetly moving Bridgett McCain), who is stricken with Alzheimer’s. Shelly’s younger siblings Donnie and Averie have their own difficulties too, and all the stress and absurdity and struggle coincide as Dot moves in and out of lucidity.

Despite the play’s impressive pedigree — premiered at the prestigious Humana Festival in Louisville in 2015, staged Off-Broadway at the Vineyard the following year — and the playwright’s evident personal connection to the material, I can’t escape feeling that the script needed further workshopping, particularly the first act, which leans very heavily on exposition. For most of the first act, whenever the characters aren’t lobbing information and shocking revelations at each other, they’re coming in already with heightened emotions about secondary plot points. And perhaps a character with dementia named “Dotty” and a loyal caregiver named “Fidel” is a bit too on the nose.

The first act particularly impacts the character of next-door neighbor Jackie — no knock against Pamela Northrup’s solid performance — whose dialogue is mainly serving up reactions to Shelly’s exposition (a virtual loop of “Really?” “Oh!” “And then what?” and “Noooo!”) before announcing, “I’m pregnant!” She then gets the ignominy of being all but forgotten in the second act before literally being picked up off the floor from behind the couch like an old coat. I can’t immediately recall a character so ill-served by a playwright, especially one with a primary background in acting.

As Shelly, Brianna Nobles has the unenviable task of playing a character so raw and burnt out that her choices make her nearly unlikeable. Day drinking, lying, constantly correcting, arguing with, or otherwise enfeebling her mother when she was confused or in a fog of forgetfulness. Nobles manages to find the human moments and pulls Shelly back from the abyss, which is no small task.

When middle child Donnie (an earnest Luke Hellyer) and husband Adam (an ebullient Mark Boisvert) sneak in after dark in mid-argument about the juice cleanse they ill-advisedly chose to start just before Christmas (please, any good queer knows the best time to start a juice cleanse is New Years Day!), I begin to wonder if Domingo is intentionally setting up his characters to fail.

After a long first act of info-dumping and yelling, I approached the second act with some trepidation. I don’t know if I would call the second act a Christmas miracle, but the arrivals of youngest daughter Averie (Jo Monsplaisir) and slightly illegal caregiver Fidel (James-Curtis Bowers) navigate us through the choppy waters and right the ship. Monsplaisir’s energy and vitality and Bowers’ grounded, empathetic performance provide much-needed spirit and human decency. I enjoy the irony that Averie, a minor internet celebrity, ends up being the most selfless character. Kudos are due to Bowers and dialect coach Maureen Roult for their accent work.

As the script starts finding its humanity, the tension between the characters becomes more rooted, the performances sharpen, Rikki Lacewell’s direction tightens up, and we can start connecting to these characters as they look past their own problems to repair the harm they do to each other, and the play ends up being an effective argument for the power of family and love in a time of crisis, and I must acknowledge Silver Spring Stage’s commitment to making space for BIPOC stories and artists.

Joey Olson’s set design is quite impressive; Don Slater’s lighting and director Lacewell’s sound and costuming also create a warm, homey environment. I attended opening night, and I’m confident that issues with pace and cues will pick up over its run. It’s only playing for two weeks, and it’s worth your attention.

Running Time: Two hours and 15 minutes, with a 15-minute intermission.

Dot plays through December 15, 2024 (Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00 pm, and Saturdays and Sundays at 2:00 pm) at Silver Spring Stage, 10145 Colesville Road, Silver Spring, MD. Purchase tickets ($22–$25, with discounts for seniors and students) at the door or online. For more information, call (301) 593-6036, visit the website, or email contact@ssstage.org.

COVID Safety: Masks are encouraged but not required.

Dot by Colman Domingo
Directed by Rikki Lacewell

CAST
Dotty: Bridgett McCain
Shelly: Brianna Nobles
Jackie: Pamela Northrup
Donnie: Luke Hellyer
Adam: Mark Boisvert
Averie: Jo Monplaisir
Fidel: James-Curtis Bowers

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I somehow have lived to this ripe middle age and worked in the theater for three decades without ever having seen a production of Joseph Kesselring’s macabre farce Arsenic and Old Lace. Never read it. Haven’t even seen the movie starring Cary Grant. Apart from a general familiarity with the plot and the antics of the wildly dysfunctional and charmingly murderous Brewster family, I went into the Arts Barn in Gaithersburg last night with a largely clean slate.

The play is over 80 years old now, and after its notable run of 1,444 performances on Broadway, it apparently became the exclusive province of amateur troupes worldwide; if anything, the script’s baked-in and time-tested comedic elements mean that it can endure even the Rudest of Mechanicals. Yet where other plays from that era like Our Town are still performed by theater companies at all levels, the regional and semi-pro theater world has yet to reclaim Arsenic; perhaps they know something the community theater world doesn’t?

I have to imagine that this was a bracingly shocking comedy for its time, and the darkly comic elements might have been a tonic for audiences looking to escape the grim news from Europe and the Pacific. This seemingly sweet pair of rich old spinster sisters, descended from the Mayflower and flush with family money, have killed a dozen solitary male boarders, buried in the basement by their delusional nephew Teddy, who thinks he’s Theodore Roosevelt and that these poor souls had died of yellow fever during the digging of the Panama Canal. Then there’s the prodigal Jonathan, a murderous gangster with a body count rivaling his aunts, traveling with his personal plastic surgeon Dr. Einstein. And then, the worst of the lot, is Mortimer. He’s… brace yourself… a drama critic.

There are definitely elements that have not aged well. A lot of the humor is topical but dated, though judging by the audience, Hitler jokes still have mileage. Mortimer’s description of his family as “If Strindberg wrote ‘Hellzapoppin’” might require a pair of explanatory footnotes in the program (along with, alas, the concept of a professional drama critic). And the whole schtick about how much Jonathan looked like Boris Karloff in theory should only work when actually played by Boris Karloff (which he did for most of the Broadway run). And then there’s the issue of how the ingenue character, Elaine Harper, unconditionally loves Mortimer; lucky for him given how utterly awful he is to her throughout the play.

As a critic, I’ve focused lately on the region’s community scene, and thus far I’ve been fortunate to have seen productions that largely transcended their amateur status with inspired performances and/or directing. Sandy Spring Theatre Group’s production is… a bit more of a struggle.

I preface my critical remarks by noting that a semi-pro reviewer with a background in professional theater runs the risk of inherent unfairness when reviewing a community theater production. Even grading on a curve, if I’m too effusive, I’m patronizing. If I’m too harsh, I’m a bully. All I can do as a reviewer is evaluate how likely that you, the prospective audience member, will have a good time.

If there were issues with actors stumbling over lines and cue pickups, and some tech cues not quite happening at the right time, I must acknowledge that I attended opening night, and if the show perhaps needed another week of run-throughs before opening, the it will likely be much tighter by its January 28 closing.

John Van Eck is a capable lead as Mortimer, Maureen Betz endures through a thankless role as Elaine, Ted Culler is suitably menacing as Boris, I mean, Jonathan, and Steve Kaufman nearly steals the show as Dr. Einstein. Karen Winokur and Julia Frank are treacly-sweet as the pair of serial killers, and indeed the entire cast is consistent.

The biggest issue with the production is that Arsenic is supposed to be a farce, and under David Levin’s direction it never quite reaches the requisite level of manic energy. Instead of a rolling boil, it lumbers along for two and a half hours on a low simmer, letting the script do the bulk of the heavy lifting.  Even with the cast toiling gamely and an opening night audience doing their level best to give them the benefit of the doubt, it never quite finds its lane, and we do feel the full length of the running time.

That said, it’s hard for me to hold the director accountable when his day job is literally curing cancer; truly, this is a reminder that this is an amateur cast who have fulfilling careers in other fields and are all doing this for fun. Even if this wasn’t my cup of tea, believe me, I’ve seen professional theaters and aspiring semi-pro groups deliver far greater crimes against the art form.

Just… stay out of my basement.

Running Time: Two hours and 30 minutes, including intermission.

Arsenic and Old Lace plays through January 28, 2024 (Fridays and Saturdays at 8 pm, Sundays at 2 pm), presented by Sandy Spring Theatre Group performing at the Gaithersburg Arts Barn, 311 Kent Sq Rd, Gaithersburg MD. Purchase tickets ($22; $20, student; $15, 14 and under) online.

COVID Safety: Masks are encouraged but not required.

Arsenic and Old Lace
By Joseph Kesselring
Directed by David Levin
Cast: Karen Winokur (Abby), Julia Frank (Martha), John Van Eck (Mortimer), Ted Culler (Jonathan), Jim Kitterman (Teddy), Maureen Betz (Elaine), Nathan Chadwick (Dr. Harper/Lt. Rooney), Steve Kaufman (Dr. Einstein), Peter Orvetti (Brophy), Trish Pisarra (O’Hara), Margaret McCabe Janicki (Klein), Ed Silverstein (Gibbs/Witherspoon)

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My latest foray into exploring the area’s community theater scene brings me down Route 50 to Bowie, Maryland, where in the woods at the far end of White Marsh Park there sits the cozy Bowie Playhouse, home of Bowie Community Theatre, currently making an impressive stab at Arthur Miller’s All My Sons through April 23.

Arthur Miller raised contemporary ethical struggles to the epic heights of Greek tragedy, putting characters like Willy Loman, Joe Keller, and Eddie Carbone on a level with Oedipus, Orestes, and the like. The fall of the House of Keller is no less relevant or tragic than the fall of the House of Atreus. In the heady optimism following World War Two, All My Sons — Miller’s first major success — came as a brutal slap in the face, a lone voice in the wilderness calling out the hypocrisy of so-called patriots who would readily betray their principles or their neighbors for economic gain while donning a thin veneer of public respectability.

Joe Keller is, at least by what we can gather at first glance, a beloved and respected figure in the community. He runs a successful manufacturing business and made a lot of money from government contracts during WW2. He’s a Gold Star father, having lost a son in the Pacific. He’s brought his other son, also a veteran, into the business. But this seemingly ideal family, as we learn, is held together with lies and secrets, and everything unravels over the course of a single fateful day with devastating consequences.

Bowie Community Theatre isn’t afraid to tackle the heightened emotions and tragic catharses of Arthur Miller’s script and does quite a creditable job of bringing the play to life. They have a ringer in the cast in Janet Constable Preston, as the Keller matriarch Kate, who brings emotional weight to a challenging role. Gene Valendo also impresses as Joe, presenting first as a genial, kindly patriarch but able to plumb those darker depths when provoked.

Director Fred Nelson gets solid performances from an ensemble of community theater regulars and amateurs. Anthony Cosgrove is a high school senior playing the thirty-something George Deever, but his confident and poised performance shows a wisdom and talent beyond his years. Melanie Wuertzer, in her first play, impresses as the venomous neighbor Sue Bayliss. Dana Fleischer and Thomas Donahue are an appealing pair of ingenues as Ann and Chris, also bringing the needed intensity in the latter acts.

The set — co-designed by Nelson, co-producer Alan Barnett, and David Chalmers (who delivers a solid performance as Dr. Bayliss) — accomplishes a lot with a little. Nelson also constructs effective sound tableaux that place us squarely in the right time period along with Cindy Andersen’s costuming and Sascha Nelson’s wigs and props.

Does the experience level of the cast make an impact? A bit. The emotional climax does slide into histrionics, rather like a firefighter with an out-of-control firehose. But they make a full investment of their energy into their performances, and Fred Nelson’s direction is subtle and supportive. All in all, it’s a solid community effort, and the ethical themes — just as relevant today as they were nearly 80 years ago — are no less haunting. BCT delivers a good night out.

Running Time: Two and a half hours with two intermissions.

All My Sons plays through April 23, 2023, presented by Bowie Community Theatre performing at The Bowie Playhouse, 16500 White Marsh Park Drive, Bowie, MD. Tickets (general admission, $22; seniors 62+ and students, $17) can be purchased online. Performances are not streamed.

COVID Safety: Masks are recommended but not required.

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In the greater DC region, an entire ecosystem of community theater exists and thrives largely outside of the professional and semi-pro sphere. They have their own support organization that gives out annual WATCH Awards, with 30 member organizations. Many have loyal audiences, robust funding, nice venues, and talented artists. This may be news to some people.

There is a tangible schism between the two worlds. I’ve worked with hundreds of non-Equity DC-area actors who existed in various shades of the vast gray area of semi-professional theater, but only a few who have actually worked in local community theater. Some of these groups require membership fees, which is a line in the sand for some people (myself included). I note with some regret that I can count the number of WATCH-eligible productions I’ve seen on a single hand, and I’m as culpable as any in maintaining this schism.

Little Theatre of Alexandria has been around for nearly 90 years. They’ve had their own building in the heart of Old Town for 60 years, which they own outright: a sumptuous 200-seat space that would be the envy of many small professional companies, especially given the number of venues that have disappeared in the past several years. They have a healthy budget, high production values, a playbill packed with ads from local businesses, a core of committed volunteers, and — judging from opening night, at least — a large and loyal audience. They’re perhaps the quintessence of a successful community theater.

That said, there are some tropes that even the best community groups can’t shake. There will likely be variation, sometimes wide, in talent and experience. There will sometimes be some casting choices that result in some age-inappropriate relationships. Frequently in addition to the contemporary musicals, old chestnuts, comedies, and holiday material, there’s a potboiler murder mystery — often Agatha Christie, occasionally not — complete with its own subset of tropes, many of which have not aged well.

And thus here we are at the opening night of Little Theatre of Alexandria’s production of George Batson’s Design for Murder, their season’s murder mystery. Batson is an obscure, long-deceased playwright active in the ’40s and ’50s with a handful of short-run Broadway titles (this not among them) and a few TV credits, but apparently with enough industry clout to get Tallulah Bankhead to play the lead. Design for Murder is a fairly well-structured exemplar of the genre; even if nobody will confuse it with Dame Agatha, it’s still in the catalog and gets mileage on community stages, and LTA does it sufficient justice to deliver an intriguing night out.

The widow Celia Granger (Kathy Ohlhaber in a poised and confident turn in Tallulah’s role) lives with her moody artist/playboy son David (James Lorenzin) in an imposing house overlooking the upper reaches of the Hudson River in upstate New York. We meet them on the occasion of David’s engagement to a rich debutante — good news given their precarious finances — though he’s having a dalliance with the young housemaid Kathy (Elizabeth Loyal), his muse for a potentially scandalous painting that could ruin everything.

When Kathy is run down by a car late that night, there are a large number of people in the house who are suddenly under scrutiny. The chauffeur Moreno (a campily sinister Denny Martinez-Barrera) knows secrets and exploits Celia for blackmail. Kathy’s replacement Nora (a spritely, vivacious Pete Leggett) arrives with suspicious promptness and an ambiguous backstory. Even Inspector Carlin (a gruffly effective Brendan Chaney) may have ulterior motives.

Of course, there’s a dark and stormy night, the body count mounts, and there are accusations and recriminations, until the final twist, which is sufficiently surprising to deliver a late thrill. A few of the red herrings in the script might just be lazy writing and abandoned plot elements. As I previously hinted, the wide variance in talent impacts some key roles. It’s billed as a comedy murder mystery, but apart from some campy elements specific to the genre, there’s not an overabundance of laughs, and a lot of the action is subsumed by expository writing; it seemed like the most exciting, vibrant action was happening offstage, quite often with characters we never meet.

Jessie Roberts directs efficiently and keeps the action flowing, and Julie Fischer’s set design is quite sumptuous. Judy Welihan’s costuming is effective, the lighting by Cleo Potter and Jay Stein is moody, and I appreciated the details like the rear-projected flames in the fireplace (via Jon Roberts, who also provided sound design).

I lived walking distance from LTA for several years while a working actor and never crossed the threshold until this show, and I can’t help but think that more communication/crossover between the region’s community theaters and smaller professional companies — and their respective audiences — would be mutually beneficial.

Running Time: Approximately two hours 15 minutes with intermission.

Design for Murder plays through November 5, 2022, at Little Theatre of Alexandria, 600 Wolfe Street, Alexandria VA. For tickets ($24–$27), call (703) 683-0496 or go online. 

COVID Safety: Little Theatre of Alexandria requires all persons attending performances to wear a mask indoors.

Design for Murder by George Batson
Directed by Jessie Roberts
Produced by Carol Strachan
Assistant producer: Hilary Adams

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As the Soviet Union slowly wakes from the nightmarish regime of Stalin, a government official interrogates a psychiatrist about a paper she submitted for publication regarding a patient of hers 20 years ago who had the gift — or curse — of total recall in D.W. Gregory’s play Memoirs of a Forgotten Man, an intriguing tale ably told by Washington Stage Guild through May 29 at the Undercroft.

Premiered at the Contemporary American Theatre Festival in 2018, Memoirs — based on a true story — is told in flashback; the framing scenes are set in 1957, as the Soviet Union tentatively and slowly adjusts to life after Stalin, while the main story unfolds between 1937–38.

A mural of Stalin’s enormous face dominates Joseph Musumeci Jr’s set, and his legacy looms large over the characters. The specter of the totalitarian surveillance state, and the lingering psychological scars it left, impact the meetings between the interrogator Kreplev and the psychiatrist Natalya: she is instinctively self-protective and mistrustful.

The subject of her research decades prior, a young man named Alexei, not only has the ability to recall events, perfectly reciting speeches heard once years earlier, even claiming to remember his own birth; he also has synesthesia, associating tactile sensations to words, or taste or colors with sounds. His brain is … wired differently.

The challenge for Alexei, a low-level journalist, is his guileless naiveté about how dangerous his abilities are to himself and his family in the midst of Stalin’s Great Purge, in a country where history is very malleable. He unwisely mentions disgraced and “disappeared” former leaders like Kirov and Bukharin, and the snowball starts to roll. Soon his family are under scrutiny, the busybody neighbors start getting nosier, and he feels the heavy hand of the Stalinist regime upon him. He is desperate for some kind of solution; how can a man who remembers everything learn to forget?

Director Kasi Campbell keeps what could be a very talky and static affair flowing. The cast switch back and forth between their various characters nimbly, we always know where we are and when, and the relatively spare set pieces — a desk, a table, and a few chairs — are used to great effect.

Steven Carpenter and Lynette Rathnam have an intriguing chemistry as Kreplev and Natalya, as likewise do Rathnam and Chris Stinson’s Alexei. Stinson maybe leans into the wide-eyed naif a bit too much, though his sweetness and simplicity draw us in. All four actors play multiple characters; Carpenter also ably doubles as Alexei’s increasingly frustrated older brother, Vasily. Rathnam also oozes sinister smarm as the nosy neighbor Demidova. WSG co-founder Laura Giannarelli creates a number of intriguing supporting characters, Alexei and Vasily’s widowed mother, as well as Alexei’s teacher and boss.

There’s a shock revelation that in retrospect is perhaps a bit obvious, though the final scene, a reunion 20 years in the making, does pack a significant emotional wallop. Ultimately, it’s a very timely play as the concept of a country going through its own sort of upheaval and looking to impose tight reins on what is taught as history is not so lost to the mists of time as we might want to think. Memoirs is a useful lesson on how history repeats, even when we attempt to repress it.

Running Time: Two hours, including one intermission.

Memoirs of a Forgotten Man plays through May 29, 2022, presented by Washington Stage Guild performing at the Undercroft Theatre inside the Mount Vernon Place United Methodist Church, 900 Massachusetts Ave NW, Washington, DC. For tickets ($50–$60), call (202) 900-8788 or purchase online.

COVID Safety: Masks are required at all times in the theater; proof of vaccination must be shown at the door. The Stage Guild’s complete Health and Safety Policy is here.

Memoirs of a Forgotten Man by D.W. Gregory, directed by Kasi Campbell, produced by Washington Stage Guild. Scenic Design: Joseph Musumeci Jr. Costumes: Sigrid Johannesdottir. Lighting: Marianne Meadows. Sound: Neil McFadden. Fight Choreography: Paul Hope. Stage Manager: Arthur Nordlie. Cast: Steven Carpenter (Kreplev, Vasily), Laura Giannarelli (Old Woman, Teacher, Mother, Utkina), Lynette Rathnam (Natalya, Demidova), Chris Stinson (Alexei, Azarov).

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During this year-plus away from live theater, many artists and creators took the opportunity to look deep into their processes and methodologies. The goal was not to get “back to normal,” per se, but to reevaluate the pervasive systemic exclusion of marginalized voices in the performing arts. While some theaters emerging from dormancy have seemingly learned nothing, and others if little else can write ambitiously overhauled mission statements, some theaters are stepping up with first-rate exemplars of exciting, intelligent, inclusive theater that can carry the art form forward.

Baltimore’s Rapid Lemon Productions is cautiously reentering live production — all cast/crew and audience masked, 25 percent capacity, and all performances simultaneously livestreamed — and their first nearly-post-pandemic production is the world premiere of Chicago-based playwright Derek Lee McPhatter’s complex sci-fi drama Serious Adverse Effects, running through May 23 at the Motor House.

In the near future, a debilitating disease known as The Syndrome has spread through the population, chiefly impacting poor African American women. Ten years ago, Paula Williams (Kyla Hammond) and her sister Nia underwent an experimental therapy offered by Dr Stallings and his graduate assistant Nichelle Vye (Valerie Lewis) that resulted in Nia’s death. Now Dr Vye has reached out to Paula again; she has been secretly pursuing research further on her own, and claims to have made a major breakthrough.

Paula is clearly traumatized by her sister’s death and mistrustful of Dr. Vye, but nonetheless finds herself drawn in, partially because she wants to stabilize her heath enough to start a family with her fiancé Brandon, but especially when preliminary therapy — which accesses the patient’s inner consciousness — not only bears fruitful results but suggests the possibility that Nia may actually still be alive, albeit on another plane of existence.

Science fiction has historically been a useful means to talk not about the future but about the present, couching contemporary social issues inside plots about aliens and mad scientists and such. McPhatter, an African American playwright, peppers the script with a lot of weighty concepts, some universal, others definitely intended to resonate with Black audiences. The notion of a white scientist (presuming Dr. Stalling was Caucasian) experimenting on Black subjects evokes the Tuskegee Experiment. There are also occasional references to the North Star, and at least one mention of “following the drinking gourd,” a folk song denoting fugitive slaves’ route to freedom using the North Star as a guide.

This is a fascinating piece of theater — written before the pandemic — with a gripping theme of spiritual transcendence, and Rapid Lemon’s production team is largely up to the task of realizing it effectively. Set Designer Bruce Kapplin, Lighting Designer Allan Sean Weekes, and Prop Artist Flynn Harne create a lab environment that’s simultaneously cold and clinical but still exploding with vibrant color. Moods are further heightened by Noah Silas’s projections and Max Garner’s sound design.

I presume it’s a limitation of budget that what is described as a “chamber” in which the patient sits for their therapy is realized onstage as an exam chair on a low platform, and that the encounters in the “healing place” aren’t able to be further distinguished on stage from the action in the “real” world. It also may be that this distinctiveness was very much there and I wasn’t able to fully perceive it through my Zoom feed watching a single camera perspective, so I can’t fault Director Noah Silas. Regardless of any challenges, he keeps the action brisk, even if from my remote view the staging tends to keep some of McPhatter’s futuristic magical realism grounded in the here and now.

I also had some challenges between my hearing and the occasionally spotty audio feed. Consequently, I lost some dialogue and a lot of nuance between the actors, further compounded by their masks, so any appraisal of the acting company has to bear that in mind. Valerie Lewis and Kyla Hammond are nonetheless well-matched leads, Maria Marsalis is effectively ethereal as Nia, and Max Johnson lets Brandon cross the line, as the only male and only white character, into possessiveness and entitlement.

Many theaters locally and nationally should take note both of McPhatter’s fascinating play and of Rapid Lemon’s mission statement. If any producer or audience member might secretly (or not so secretly) be put off by greater diversity and representation onstage, citing coded terms like “marketable” or “accessible,” and clutching a dated conception of “Black” theater, it’s their loss. Serious Adverse Effects is a North Star to follow.

Running Time: Approximately 90 minutes, no intermission.

Serious Adverse Effects by Derek Lee McPhatter, directed by Noah Silas, presented by Rapid Lemon productions, plays through May 23, 2021, at Motor House, 120 W. North Avenue, Baltimore, MD. All performances will be live, and available both online and in person. Tickets for both can be purchased online.

Cast: Valerie Lewis (Dr Vye), Kyla Hammond (Paula), Max Johnson (Brandon), Maria Marsalis (Nia). Crew: Bruce Kapplin (Set Design) Deana Fisher Brill (Costume Design), Allan Sean Weekes (Lighting Design), Max Garner (Sound Design, Producer), Flynn Harne (Prop Design, Production Stage Manager), Noah Silas (Projections), Agyeiwaa Asante (Dramaturgy).

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Jon, a filmmaker just starting to make a name for himself, comes home for the premiere of his latest film at the Lansing Film Festival. His old high school friend Vince, now a small-time drug dealer, gets Jon to talk about a sexual encounter ten years ago with Amy, whom they both dated in high school, that may or may not have been consensual. The discussion becomes increasingly tense and confrontational, Vince reveals that he has been surreptitiously tape-recording Jon’s recall of the incident, and when Amy arrives, confessions, apologies, and revelations abound in Stephen Belber’s 1999 play Tape, being presented as a livestream performance by TheSharedScreen.

What was originally set in a dingy room in a Motel 6 is updated — with Belber’s blessing — to a Zoom call, and the trio of actors — Neal Davidson (Jon), Travis Schweiger (Vince), and Chelsea J. Smith (Amy) — are delivering their performances separately from DC, NYC, and California. Producer/Adapter Davidson penned this preview article for DCMTA in December, describing the revelation that came as the acting master class he was taking moved onto Zoom, and how that changed the way the actors interacted, to the point that he founded TheSharedScreen to explore the potential of Zoom theater.

Davidson bills this as a “powerful new theatrical medium” he dubs dramatic betweenness. It’s theater, I suppose, in the sense that we’re watching a live performance in real time, but then with the audience in gallery view as “silent and invisible witnesses” with their cameras and mics disabled, leaving the audience and performers cut off from one another, is it really? It’s billed as “in your face” and “intensely personal” with the actors “eye-to-eye” with the audience except it…isn’t. The actors aren’t making eye contact with us but with their webcams; any connection between performer and audience is entirely illusory, and the audience are less participants than voyeurs, to the extent that I wonder why the actors bother performing live at all.

Time will tell if this is the birth of an entirely new theatrical paradigm or if this is a temporary pandemic-obligated detour. People more well-versed than I in dramatic theory can debate its artistic validity; I suspect that there are other theatrical endeavors in the past year that have more deeply explored the potential of alternative theatrical mediums (see 4615’s programming), but I’m more qualified to comment and reflect on the actual finished product in terms of its visceral impact on me as a viewer.

Tape is tailor-made for Zoom adaptation, and Davidson’s selection is savvy, even if a few nagging issues come up — does anyone even use mini-cassette recorders anymore? Could Vince have digitally recorded the Zoom call instead? And since nobody is physically preventing him, what keeps Jon from leaving the call when things get uncomfortable?

The biggest barrier to my embracing this production is the inability or unwillingness of the cast — particularly Davidson and Schwieger — to adjust their broad performance styles to suit the intimate medium of Zoom. Director (and the cast’s acting coach) John Dapolito, for better or worse, lets the actors run wild and indulge their excesses. Whether it’s the former’s overgesticulating, or the latter’s predictable unpredictability bouncing off the walls and furniture like a superball, the level of artifice that might read (slightly) more natural in a larger performance space comes across as, respectively, belabored and cartoonish. In Jon’s own words, the “competition over who’s more authentic” is a scoreless draw. Chelsea Smith’s comparative subtlety and understated rootedness when she arrives midway through the 90-minute performance is a breath of fresh air, though it’s not long before she rivals the others in scenery chewing.

From a technical standpoint, the production is impressive, except for frequent dead air between the actors’ lines that I couldn’t tell was attributable to tech lag or simply actors needing to pick up their cues.

At best, TheSharedScreen’s Tape is a flawed exploration of an alternative performance medium, at worst it’s a self-indulgent acting class project.

The pandemic has created new paradigms — some permanent, others likely not — in many aspects of our lives: the way we work, shop, eat, absorb culture, or express (and occasionally monetize) one’s sexuality. But just as there are few who would legitimately imagine that a webcam stripshow on OnlyFans will permanently replace dating and hookups, I can’t imagine that I am bearing witness to the future of theater. At least not this particular production. But then again, who knows? I might be as cluelessly dismissive in hindsight as the Decca executive who passed on signing the Beatles in 1962 saying, “Guitar groups are on their way out.”

I’m obliged to point out that this performance is being presented for free, and that’s legitimately admirable (donations are encouraged; actors after all have to eat). That being said, if you have an Amazon Prime subscription, the 2001 film version directed by Richard Linklater starring Uma Thurman, Robert Sean Leonard, and Ethan Hawke is also free.

Running Time: About 90 minutes, plus open-ended live talkback.

Tape presented live by TheSharedScreen performs next at 8 pm ET Fridays and Saturdays February 12–13 and 19–20, 2021. Lobby opens at 7:30 pm ET. No intermission, 90 minutes. Live talkback follows. Tickets, which are free, are available online.

(This review is based on a recording that DCMTA was provided of the live February 5, 2021, opening performance and talkback.)

CREDITS
Written by Stephen Belber
Directed by John Dapolito
Adapted by Neal Davidson
With Neal Davidson (Jon), Travis Schweiger (Vince), and Chelsea J. Smith (Amy)
Presented by TheSharedScreen
Producer: Neal Davidson
Assistant Producer: Kristen Noriega

SEE ALSO:
Riveting adaptation of ‘Tape’ to unreel live on line six nights only
Using Zoom in a new way to create theater that transforms how we see feature by Neal Davidson
TheSharedScreen’s ‘Tape’ unspools tense and scorching storytelling review by Michael Poandl

Ditch the “Is this theater?” debate, by Jordan Friend and Gregory Keng Strasser

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