Andrew Long, Ted van Griethuysen, and Aubrey K. Deeker form an uneasy alliance in Antony and Cleopatra. Photo by Carol Pratt. Antony and Cleopatra is a sprawling, lumbering beast of a play — war, international intrigue, doomed love — but the best stuff in the Shakespeare Theatre’s current production is the smallest stuff: he-said/she-said, jealousy, drunkenness. When Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt, learns from a rightly mortified messenger that Antony, the Roman General with whom…

If you walk past a theater marquee and the sign displays something ridiculous, like Beverly Hills: 90210: The Musical, three little words should make you put your reservations aside and rush to the auditorium: “Starring Carolee Carmello.” The overwhelmingly talented musical theater star, known for her Broadway work in such vehicles as Parade and Urinetown, could sell just about anything. Unfortunately, she’s got her work cut out with her in Kathie Lee Gifford’s stab at…

So the big winners at last night’s Helen Hayes awards were… puppets? Indeed, Aaron Posner’s unique vision for Measure for Measure, produced at the Folger this year, where puppets took on many of the play’s roles, earned him a best director trophy (he tied with Michael Kahn, for his zany take on Love’s Labor Lost), as well as the award for Outstanding Resident Play. Signature Theater’s Assassins won the most awards of the night with…

Tonight, the D.C. theater community will descend on Warner Theater, decked out in tuxes, kilts, ball gowns and whatever else the artsy crowd comes up with to approximate “black tie” attire. It’s the night each year they get the chance to party their brains out and recognize the outstanding contributions they’ve made this year; it’s the Helen Hayes Awards. As busy theater critics with day jobs, we don’t get the chance to attend and review…

Perhaps not every reader spent long car rides singing along with her family to the soundtrack of Oliver! like this DCist, but the story’s familiar to anyone who’s tackled Charles Dickens, or grew up on the somewhat-forgotten Disney classic, Oliver And Company. Olney Theatre has taken the dusty but resilient old musical, based on the life of a lonely orphan and his association with a band of thieves, and given it brisk pacing and a…