Premiere of Pulitzer-finalist play at Olney
Marjorie Prime at the Olney Theater Center is a strange, gripping and ultimately touching play. Is is set in the future, and looks at how we remember the past to keep going in the present.The play gets underway as Marjorie, an 85-year-old woman nearing dementia, is having a perfectly reasonable conversation with her deceased husband, who is sitting across from her as he appeared at the age... READ MORE
Broadway performer gets people dancing
CJay Philip has enjoyed a long, successful career as a professional dancer in both modern and African dance companies, as a Broadway and touring performer in such shows as Dreamgirls, Big the Musical, Street Corner Symphony, Legally Blonde, and Hairspray, and as a popular dance fitness instructor at some of New York’s premiere health clubs.But when she moved to Baltimore in 2010 for... READ MORE
Stuff: one man’s show about his family
“At 65, I realize that I made some terrible choices, none of them for me.”From the diary of Edith Feffer, October 1988That excerpt from the long-secret journals of playwright John Feffer’s mother is at the heart of his idiosyncratic, but sometimes absorbing, play titledStuff.It returns to the area in a limited run this month at Studio 1469 in D.C.’s Columbia... READ MORE
Jewish federation to host Bach to Broadway
Jewish Federation of the Desert, headquartered in Rancho Mirage, will once again present an evening of Israeli musical entertainment and culture for the community when it presents “Bach to Broadway” on March 21 from 7 to 9 p.m.This two-part concert will be performed at the Indian Wells Theatre on the Palm Desert campus of Cal State San Bernardino, and will feature the artistry... READ MORE
Songs still carry the show in South Pacific
It wasn’t a completely enchanted evening. Nevertheless, the production of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific at Toby’s Dinner theater in Columbia did at times exuberantly, dramatically and tunefully evoke that mid-20th century period when America fought an all-out war and Broadway provided the country’s maximum musical expression.The lives and times of the Navy ... READ MORE
Artist revives longtime interest in beads
Thea Fine is a self-described “recovering health policy wonk who writes.” Now, though, after a long career in the federal government, Fine prefers to describe herself as a beading designer.The Ellicott City resident first learned how to bead as a child during summer vacations with her maternal grandmother, Rose — “a Renaissance woman who never met a craft she... READ MORE
WASPs barred from Arlington Cemetery
The ashes of World War II veteran Elaine Harmon are sitting in a closet in her daughter’s home, where they will remain until they can go to what her family says is her rightful resting place: Arlington National Cemetery.Harmon piloted aircraft in World War II under a special program, Women Airforce Service Pilots, that flew noncombat missions to free up male pilots for combat. Granted ... READ MORE
First timer’s musical looking for a stage
Four years ago, Columbia resident Gayle Westmoreland was watching the news when inspiration struck. Her television was filled with bleak news about the high unemployment rates in America and Europe, and suddenly the words “Just Soar” appeared in her mind.Those two words began an unexpected chain reaction for Westmoreland. After jotting them down, she developed them into what she ... READ MORE
Revisiting Wilder’s enduring Our Town
Billed as “America’s Oldest Continuously Performing Little Theatre,” the Vagabond Players in Fells Point is celebrating its 100th season by reviving plays “that were particularly successful in the past,” so sayeth their press release.One of these past glories is playwright Thornton Wilder’s thick slice of Americana, Our Town, which was previously produced ... READ MORE
Alexandria capitalizes on new PBS series
“Blood is not gray or blue. It’s all one color,” says Dr. Jed Foster in “Mercy Street” — the upcoming PBS Civil War medical drama set in 1862 in the war-torn border town of Alexandria, Va.The lives and cultures of two volunteer nurses on opposite sides of the conflict intertwine as they confront war’s agonies, injuries and deaths in a former hotel... READ MORE
