DCist's January Theater Preview
It's official: we're going to have no social life this January, as there are too many great productions premiering this month for us to do anything else but plays, plays, plays. We've got a ridiculous amount of Shakespeare, a beloved Sondheim musical, a new work by an old favorite, and we haven't even gotten to Kathleen Turner. It's a good month to be a theater lover.
We adore Neil LaBute here at DCist, even though he gets us every time with his sadistic twists. His newest work, This is How It Goes opens at Studio (Jan 3).
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid inspired me to long for screenwriter William Goldman's way with words. In Mojo Mickybo at Keegan Theatre, the popular movie inspires two youths to become modern-day outlaws (Jan 5).
"Agony/Far More Painful Than Yours/When You Know She Would Go With You/If There Only Were Doors". Such is Rapunzel's prince's lament in Sondheim's delightful and at times even profound fractured fairytale, Into The Woods, which Signature will stage as its first production in its new facility (Jan 12).
So. Much. Shakespeare. You'd think that the citywide "Shakespeare in Washington" were kicking off this month or something. We'll post with more details later in this week, but for starters, we've got King Lear at the Folger (Jan 11), Synetic's Macbeth (Jan. 13), Richard III opening at Shakespeare Theater (Jan 16) and Church Street Theater's The Tempest.
New company Active Cultures in Prince George's performs Hansel and Gretel Eat Crabs (a musical, natch). We enjoy its tagline, which casually throws cannibalism in with triumph, abandonment and beauty, but question the naming of a theater company after a yogurt ingredient. (Jan. 25)
With all the traditional Shakespearean offerings this month, iconoclasts might want to consider a new take, such as Rorschach's Rough Magic, a retelling of The Tempest (Jan 27).
Also this month:
- The aforementioned Ms. Turner stars with Bill Irwin in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at the Kennedy Center (Jan. 4).
- American Century Theatre performs Desire Under The Elms a love triangle-centered work by Eugene O'Neill (Jan. 5).
- Tyler Perry of Madea fame's What's Done In The Dark plays Warner (Jan 16).
- Arena Stage does August Wilson with its production of Gem of the Ocean (Jan 26).
- Theater J's Sleeping Arrangements, about an unlikely Bronx childhood, is a world premiere (Jan. 9)
- For the kiddies: Queen Nur: Sweet Potato Pie And Such, set to African song and dance, at Olney (Jan 27).
- A woman is torn between her dead ex-husband and her new paramour in the Woolly comedy Vigils (Jan 29).
- The man who was Kane is among the former screen legends who weave their way through the plot of Orson's Shadow at Round House in Bethesda (Jan. 31)
Still playing:
This weekend's the last for the lovely The Light in the Piazza at Kenney Center, as well as Cinderella at Olney; but there's plenty of time left for the charmingly chaotic Noises Off at Arena (Jan 28).