Live Arts

By Eileen Miller

This article was originally published in DC Theater Arts here.

There is perhaps no harder time to write political satire sketches than the current moment; there’s simply too much material to work with. How do you decide what to satirize? Hexagon, in its new show Splitting Our Sides!, has decided, through sketch, song, and dance, to dabble in nearly everything.

The volunteer-run performing arts group with a 70-year history of being “Washington’s Only Original Political Satire Musical Comedy Revue” returns to the DC stage this spring after a two-year break. Although the production, a series of sketches and musical numbers satirizing national politics, began development months earlier, it also managed to incorporate multiple digs at recent events, including Pete Hegseth’s Signal group chat scandal and the Vances’ trip to Greenland.

While balancing the absurd, the political, and even the apolitical, Splitting Our Sides! steers clear of the most frightening developments in our political landscape. Instead, the show emphasizes humor in the hopes that laughter is still a potent enough cure for our politics-driven anxieties.

Within the show are some of the staples to be expected in any DC political sketch show. In one musical number, a President Trump played by Edward Hammarlund and backed by a trio of singing dancers in white dress shirts, long red ties, and stockings, triumphantly sings about how he will be “Comin’ After” all of those who wronged him. Hammarlund’s President’s glee is laced with malice, and the jazzy number he croons offers a performance entertaining enough to make you forget for a bit the chilling threats of his agenda.

At other times, the current resident of the White House is alluded to but not mentioned outright.

In one sketch, Gerald Ford (Neil Conway) descends from Heaven to Limbo to chat with Richard Nixon (Neil McElroy) about the GOP’s new affinity for felons. The sketch’s simple yet effective set — consisting of just a direction signpost indicating the locations of Heaven, Hell, and Limbo — allows the focus to be on the two former presidents and their humor-laced ruminations over their nation’s current state.

Other acts find humor in the apolitical. One musical number — based on Oklahoma!’s “The Farmer and the Cowman” — pokes fun at another polarizing rivalry dividing DC: bicyclists vs. drivers. Backed by a lively orchestra and performed with dynamic choreography evoking the chaos of the DC commute, the musical number is an entertaining respite from politics that reminds the audience there is more to complain about in this city than politics. Another musical act, “I sold my soul to ChatGPT,” is a well-sung reminder that these are times not just of turbulent political change but of technological change as well.

Perhaps cognizant of the need to address the greater threats looming over the country, the final performance of the first act is a full-cast musical number about the importance of freedom. This song, built on a rhythmic drumbeat and led by the rich vocals of Hazara Kawah, Lilly Andemicael, and Victoria Williams, adopts a more serious tone to remind the audience of the real threats our democracy faces. Through both its full-cast participation and Kawah’s encouragement of the audience to clap to the beat with her, the performance emphasizes solidarity in the face of unnamed threats that are doubtless clear in the audience’s mind. While showcasing the cast’s vocal prowess, its message felt like an anomaly in a show that was mostly humor and less call to action.

After the intermission, the show returns to its blend of sketches and musical numbers. The humor draws laughter, and the musical numbers are especially impressive, but despite the potential of political satire, the show’s content largely sidesteps the most troubling problems that face our country.

A DC institution, Hexagon has returned to the District at a time when there is much — perhaps too much — to ridicule in our national politics. Many of the acts are well-performed and genuinely entertaining, and yet the show itself seems to belong to a different era. This dissonance is not entirely unpleasant: the musical acts emulate the powerful orchestras and grand dance numbers of the Golden Age of Broadway, a testament to the creative talent of Hexagon’s volunteer creatives.

Their brand of satire, however, harks back to a time when you could laugh about current events, maybe feel a twinge of embarrassment, but ultimately go about your day without dreading what the next day’s news cycle may bring. As our news feeds are overwhelmed by stories of ignored court orders, annexation threats against our allies, and other actions that signal a trend away from democratic practices, is it still possible to simply laugh, clap, and then go on with our lives?

Still, Hexagon’s continued presence after 70 years is a reminder of the persistence and importance of volunteer-run local theater. Splitting Our Sides! may not level thoroughly biting challenges at power, but it will still make you laugh, and maybe that is sufficient; with free expression increasingly under threat, the ability to laugh at our leaders is a power in and of itself.

By Eileen Miller

This article was originally published in DC Theater Arts here.

To enter a therapy office is to expect to open yourself up to vulnerability in front of a stranger. To enter a theater and find a therapy office onstage is to expect — perhaps with excited nosiness — to witness the vulnerability of another while comfortably behind the fourth wall. But to expect such things from Signature Theatre’s Job is to make a gross misjudgement. In this Northern California therapy office, no effort is made to generate a cozy atmosphere. Instead, therapist, client, and audience are presented with the dark side of humanity and forced to consider questions about the cost of the internet.

Job, written by Max Wolf Friedlich and directed by Matthew Gardiner, is making its DC debut at Signature Theatre after a 14-week Broadway run the previous fall. The show features a cast of two and centers around their conversation in a combative therapy session.

Jordan Slattery plays Jane, a “user care” worker whose job scrubbing graphic content from the internet drives her to a viral meltdown at work. Opposite her — often literally as the two converse from far ends of the stage — is Eric Hissom as Loyd, Jane’s work-mandated therapist tasked with determining whether she is fit to return to the office.

The play interrogates the price of the internet through the experience of one of its greatest champions. Jane, whose speech is peppered with Gen Z slang, dismissively denounces “boomers” who chastise youth for screen addictions. She defends the time spent on her phone as vehemently as she defends the job that makes her watch videos of gore and torture.

Slattery plays Jane with a frazzled intensity. She recalls the content she’s seen with disgust in her voice and a detached look on a face that can no longer cry. Slattery is most spirited when expressing Jane’s cult-like dedication to her job. Through this enthusiasm, contrasted with the devastating reality of what her work truly entails, Job presents uncomfortable questions about the tech industry and the human price of the internet.

Hissom’s performance — while initially providing a calming contrast to Slattery — shifts toward hinting at a darker tension as the play progresses. In the beginning, he speaks with a confidence laced with caution. He is not only a therapist but also a hostage negotiating his way out of a cell and a samaritan talking a woman off a bridge. Hissom’s strongest moments come when Loyd’s true feelings burst out in an explosion of anger and frustration, revealing a rage hiding beneath the therapist’s relaxed brown knit sweater and unbuttoned cuffs.

There is a painful irony in Jane’s commitment to her job. If her searing descriptions of the videos — and Slattery’s intense, red-rimmed eyes — could possibly not be enough to shock the audience, the flashbacks she suffers throughout the play also bring in startling moments that force the audience to confront her trauma. And yet Jane fiercely defends her job, craving the power that protecting others from viewing the horrors online gives her.

Job never leaves the confines of Loyd’s office, but in many ways, it ventures far beyond the bounds of that Northern California therapy office. As Jane recounts the videos of sexual and violent content she watched in her role in content moderation —  or user care, as her company euphemistically calls it — she reveals the dark side of humanity that her job tasks her with scrubbing from the internet.

Representing a virtual space onstage is difficult, but Job’s creative team makes inventive use of sound and light design to convey the online realm to which Jane craves return. When moments during the therapy session trigger memories of graphic content Jane witnessed online, a static buzz fills the air, overlaid with the detached click, click, click of a computer mouse. The lights onstage fluctuate brighter and darker — sometimes cutting out entirely — and the screen of a desktop Mac sitting in one corner glows white and draws Jane’s horrified hollow gaze. It is through these scenic modifications that the audience is immersed in Jane’s traumatic flashbacks.

This is where the work of Lighting Designer Colin K. Bills and Sound Designer Kenny Neal shines, linking the comfortable-enough therapy office to the dark world Jane has grown obsessed with. These design choices, set within a plot whose twists and surprises Friedlich gradually reveals, give the production an uneasy edge. Combined with a tension between Jane and Loyd that mounts from the start and never subsides throughout their 90-minute session, the play presents a tense thriller that ruthlessly reminds its audience of the darkness lurking behind every screen.

The thinking behind the show’s title leaves little room for doubt: Jane’s obsession with her job and the cost it wrought on her mental health are the catalysts that brought her to therapy. But it also brings to mind another interpretation that hints at the tragedy behind Jane’s situation: despite being presented with as much suffering as the Biblical Job, she never loses faith in her god — the internet.

By Leah Cohen

This article was originally published in DC Theater Arts here.

The Omnium Circus made its debut in 2021, but for founder and executive director Lisa B. Lewis, the journey began more than three decades earlier.

While performing as a clown, Lewis noticed an entire section of the arena sitting with their arms crossed and seemed angry. Despite being at the circus, they struggled to understand the acts going on around them. Lewis’ clown partner started telling jokes in sign language, and the group erupted in laughter.

“It was the power of inclusion,” she said.

In 1986 Lewis moved to New York and began working in a hospital performing a “Circus of the Senses” adapted show for children and their families. It was such a hit that parents wanted to know why they could come only once. So, Lewis created weekend and evening shows for families to experience and enjoy together. When the pandemic hit, Lewis began to push the idea further, asking how she and others could create this type of access all the time.

Omnium, a diverse, accessible, and inclusive circus, was born. The goal of the circus is to create an experience reflective and welcoming of all people. To mirror the one in four Americans with a disability, over 25 percent of the nonprofit’s performing company and 40 percent of its total team are members of the disabled community.

“The idea was to create representation so people can see themselves reflected on stage and know they are capable with hard work to be their best selves,” Lewis said.

When she presented her initial idea to current team members in 2020, Lewis worried it might have been too crazy. But no one talked her out of it. Instead, they joined her, and immediately got to work on building the show. The team behind Omnium Circus is made up of not only others like Lewis who have spent their entire careers in the industry, but newcomers as well, including members of the disabled community who never previously had the opportunity to join a circus.

For Ermiyas Muluken, a seasoned performer with over half his life dedicated to the circus industry, joining Omnium with his ladder-balancing act was more than just a new experience — it was a powerful extension of his mission to inspire through his craft.

“Circus is not just going and doing your thing and getting money,” he said. “It’s also to inspire people. It’s a message and you don’t have to speak it.”

An Ethiopian native, Muluken has since relocated to DC, where Omnium Circus will kick off its 2025 nationwide tour on February 22 at DC’s Warner Theatre.

In addition to Muluken’s ladder act, the audience will get to see the world’s fastest juggler, a chair-stacking act, and a hair-hanging act, to name a few.

During the show, Omnium offers different accessibility options including audio description for blind audience members, ASL integrated into the performance, a calming area in the lobby, ADA seating, and more. Lewis listens to members of the disability community and constantly asks how Omnium can make the experience better.

“Accessibility is not as hard as you think,” she said. “You have to pay attention and figure it out.”

Omnium Circus is an experience for the whole family to enjoy, a show for “human beings,” as Lewis explained. The 90-minute performance is an opportunity to connect and bond with others no matter the differences. During one show, for instance, a young girl sat next to another child who happened to be deaf. The two figured out how to communicate with one another and ended the show as friends.

Omnium is more than just a circus; it’s an opportunity to bring people together.

“So much is dividing us; we have to find more of what unites us,” Lewis said.

By Teniola Ayoola

This article was originally published in The DC Line here.

She riffed about parole officers, sang to white audiences about racial injustice, and used cuss words as adjectives — that’s Billie Holiday, compellingly reincarnated with fresh depth and dynamism in Mosaic Theater Company’s production of Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill. Written by Lanie Robertson, the play has been staged on and off Broadway since its 1986 premiere. It now graces Mosaic’s 10th anniversary season under the direction of Reginald L. Douglas, featuring a stellar cast and band.

Before she gained fame as Billie Holiday, she was Eleanora Fagan, born in 1915 to a jazz guitarist father and a teenage mother. Despite a turbulent childhood, Holiday rose to stardom as a jazz singer between 1935 and 1941, touring across the United States without formal technical training or the ability to read music. Faced with legal troubles and periods of incarceration due to drug use, Holiday still went on to become the first Black woman to perform with an all-white band and grew increasingly vocal about social issues and injustices of her time. 

In Lady Day, Roz White, the star of the evening, commands the stage with a charisma that channels Holiday’s legendary presence. From her dramatic entrance — where she misses her cue, makes us wait, and appears only after a fitting introduction and applause — to the final poignant notes, White’s portrayal is magnetic. Dressed to the nines by costume designer Moyenda Kulemeka in a striking white dress with Holiday’s signature elbow-length white gloves, a mink fur stole, and green slingback pumps, she sets the tone for a performance that blends meticulous craftsmanship with raw emotion.

White, known for her roles in Bessie’s Blues at Alexandria’s MetroStage as well as Broadway national tours such as TINA:The Tina Turner Musical and Dreamgirls, has a voice that effortlessly navigates through jazz standards like “What a Little Moonlight Can Do,” “Easy Livin’,” and “T’ain’t Nobody’s Business if I Do.” Her voice showcases both her vocal prowess and deep connection to the material. In “Gimme a Pigfoot (and a Bottle of Beer),” her interaction with the audience — stepping off the stage and engaging directly — adds a visceral, immersive quality to the performance, though one wishes she would have worked more of the room than just the front row. Her rendition of “Strange Fruit” is particularly haunting, with White’s intense gaze and physicality vividly evoking the pain, lynchings and injustice captured in the song’s powerful lyrics.

Douglas selected an ideal actor to bring Robertson’s script to life. Though White sometimes struggles with pacing in her dialogue (lacking the pauses and inflections that convey a natural, in-the-moment flow of thought and speech), she excels in nailing punchlines and holding an audience at rapt attention. Her recounting of Holiday’s personal stories — such as getting her first job, confronting legal troubles and racial discrimination, and receiving news of her father’s death — highlights her ability to weave humor and gravity seamlessly, so much that White gives the impression of being an even better storyteller than she is a singer. 

In the second half of the show, White delves into Holiday’s darker moments with a remarkable authenticity that elicits empathy and reflection. Her portrayal of Holiday in a state of stupor and disarray — marked by slurred speech, staggering movements and near-mishaps — brings a raw quality to the performance. The performance reaches its climax with a poignant rendition of “Deep Song,” featuring the lyrics “I only know misery has to be part of me,” before slowly fading into darkness.

Lighter aspects of this otherwise downcast production include the blues break with standout performances. A five-time Helen Hayes nominee for musical direction, William Knowles (acting the role of Holiday’s accompanist in her later years, Jimmy Powers) plays with masterful dexterity while hunched over the piano. Drummer Greg Holloway delivers a captivating solo on par with bassist Mark Saltman’s earlier one at the start of the show. 

The stage, though compact, is effectively utilized with a masterful set design by Nadir Bey that features a retro “Emerson’s Bar and Grill” sign. The lighting by Jesse Belsky enhances the show’s emotional shifts. 

Overall, Mosaic’s Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill is a memorable tribute to Billie Holiday. Blending powerful performances, evocative storytelling and a richly atmospheric setting, it serves as a reminder of the enduring impact she left on jazz despite the hardships she faced.

By Whit Davis

This article was originally published in DC Theater Arts here.

Musicals featuring Hip Hop don’t have much grey area these days; they’re either Hamilton or not. Hamilton broadened the theater audience, which helped launch the careers of formerly less celebrated actors into the mainstream. The success of the musical Hamilton arguably may be one of the reasons the Mexodus will be wildly successful.

Mexodus functions to imaginatively explore the true, barely spoken history of the Underground Railroad into Mexico. The play doesn’t rely on spectacle or subversion as major themes. Instead, it takes us on a sonically immersive sensory ride of sound and light with solid storytelling and performances by two complementary actors: Nygel D. Robinson and Brian Quijada. The musical directed by David Mendizábal makes its world premiere at Mosaic Theater Company in a co-production with Baltimore Center Stage.

Mexodus sets the stage with a scenic design by Riw Rakkulchon with elements from the 1800s during the time of slavery in the United States and some time after the Mexican-American war with hints of modern twist like instruments, vinyl scratch set, and what looks like an MPC for making beats. Imagine dark-colored wood accents and other natural elements with a DJ booth in the center of the stage. The two performers address the audience as themselves, warming up the crowd like the opening at a Hip Hop show. They display their musicianship, rhymes, and stage presence in the style of old music-producing videos found on YouTube from the era of Ryan Leslie. Robinson blends R&B, Hip Hop, Gospel, Blues, Jazz and Negro spirituals effortlessly. Quijada brings the Latin element to those genres and highlights a bit of House music as well.

Robinson has a voice that makes you sit up and pay attention. He commands the stage like all great performers tend to do. As he moves in and out of his character, Henry, it becomes clear we’re in for a treat. Robinson is a superstar with unmatched skill and precision. He takes excellent care of Henry, an enslaved man separated from his family on a Texas plantation, by honoring his pain, grief, hope, and humanness in the face of dehumanization. The slave narrative of Henry is a familiar story of looming death sometimes swift, or occurring under 100 sunrises and sunsets on a cotton field from the brutality of free labor. He is forced to run away to try to take back his life, which from birth was never his own.

In the transition from Henry’s story to Carlos’ story, we’re treated to a riveting combination of set design, light, and sound as Henry “wades through the water”; the back of the stage opens to a flowy-like material glowing with blue light and the sound of deep water. The spotlight shifts to Carlos, a former Mexican soldier who has lost everything he once knew after the Mexican-American war. Quijada delivers a compelling performance. His Spanish guitar matches the soulfulness of “Wade in the Water.” He concentrates on the curling of his brows to emphasize the seriousness and grief-stricken nature of Carlos. Henry and Carlos share much in common through the themes of pain and loss while also realizing that they need each other.

This play makes a hurling attempt to share an oral history of the Underground Railroad through Mexico and the notion of solidarity and allyship. What happens when two groups of people work together against white supremacy? Unfortunately, this play misses the mark by not directly confronting anti-Blackness and, as a result, the barriers that prevent true solidarity. It begs the question, Where does art fail? Are the limitations coming from the artists or the art form? Can an audience truly comprehend and deal with the discomfort from the devastating, violent nature of anti-Blackness if confronted head-on? Quijada hints at the monster when he recounts a story of his family stopping at a gas station on the Southside of Chicago, where he learns that Blackness equals fear for many people. Is this a play of possibilities? Despite the Underground Railroad in Mexico, the country has a deep history of anti-Blackness that persists today. When a play is heralded as possibly the next best thing since Hamilton, these conversations are overshadowed by the soundtrack of the musical, and to be fair, the music in Mexodus is quite good.

Mexodus accomplishes its goals as an exciting play that balances shared history and exceptional musicality. This is what you hope for and expect from a musical: to be entertained and maybe to walk away having learned something new. Rest assured, this production is worth seeing!

By Isaac Welch

This article was originally published in DC Theater Arts here.

The Port Tobacco Players’ production of Lorraine Hansberry’s classic A Raisin in the Sun brings to life the tale of the mid-century Black American household in an endearing display, highlighting the jovial narratives that often otherwise are overshadowed by plight and dismay. The volunteer organization brings together a cast of naturally gifted actors and actresses who at all times live at home in their roles and complement each other’s energy with willing chemistry. Paired with an ornately set stage, this production far exceeds the expectations one may hold of volunteer-based theater, yet at the same time, it maintains the wholesome reverberations of a tightly knit community.

In his director’s note, Jeremy Keith Hunter declares that “A Raisin in the Sun is not about hardship. It’s not a play about depression or loss. [It’s] a story about family, and about love… The people in this play are proud. They are energetic, funny and smart…  They are every bit as loving, joyful and passionate as they are worn, disheartened and exhausted. It was my intention,” he states, “to highlight the former of these traits — to present a family that modern audiences could relate to and understand.” In service to his community, Hunter accomplishes the task of telling the truth and brightening the narratives of the Black family that are often masked and told sullenly when recounted in America’s history. In this tale, underscored by the pursuit of financial liberation, the dynamics of the Southside Chicago-based Younger family are examined in contrast to the desires of each individual, as the family quarrels over how to best spend insurance money awarded to them after their father’s death. Dreams of business enterprise, medical school, and improved housing are lobbied for, and battled against by the discrimination and racial barriers that characterized those times, but are ultimately left to the decision of the inheritor, Lena “Mama” Younger.

In a recent showing on Mother’s Day, the Port Tobacco Players theater swelled with an atmosphere of love in community, where the play’s central themes, exploring the preservation of the matriarch and her weathered spirit, were duly understood. Maintaining the heartbeat of her household, Mama Younger, played by Dionne Belk, lives undeterred by her age, bringing unity to her household and establishing the grounds they must abide by. Belk’s confidence as she asserts her role solidifies Mama Younger as the pillar that holds her family together and brings them to well-being. Raising her voice, shaping her face to a smile, or narrowing to a stare, her act as the Grandmother undoubtedly arises from familiarity, harkening to a generation that has so dearly cared, as seen in the proliferation of America’s Black community.

While this rendition presented itself in a brighter tint, Hunter and his cast did not withhold the gut-wrenching performances that for 75 years have struck a nerve in the hearts of audiences across America and earned the play’s reputation as a classic. Most notable is Gershawn A. Mason’s portrayal of Walter Younger. Rising on drunken mania and crashing on robbery and disenfranchisement, Mason’s expressions range from heightened jubilee dancing to guttural bellows roaring on sunken knees. In his character, Mason lives the story of the Black man-of-the-house, burdened and misunderstood by the society around him, at all times exuding his passion for the art of theater. In partnership with his wife Ruth Younger, played by Marleigh Ferguson, the two endure their love tested by the hardships a white society has cast upon them, but at no point fall out of synchronicity in their act together on stage. Warm, receptive, and sternly spoken, Ferguson gracefully adapts in each scene as she navigates her role as a wife, mother, sister, and daughter-in-law. Her relationship with her child Travis Younger (Ethan Thomas) is warmly established in the play’s opening scene as she picks his hair and smothers him in a hug before he leaves for school. She holds her own in contentious meetings with her in-laws, persevering under the wing of Mama Younger and standing up for her husband against the degradation of sister Beneatha Younger (Angela Alexander).

Somewhat of an antagonist to her family’s ways, Beneatha Younger spends most of her time in the play acting on her right to independence, exploring passions, and pursuing a doctorate degree. In her act, Alexander seldom deviates from her tone, counter-culture and full of angst, which is best utilized in conversations with elders and lovers, as she looks to stave off the antiquated expectations of a patriarchal society. As she explores avenues closer to her origins, audience members are reminded of the cultural juxtapositions that complicate the lives of African Americans still today.

As the play meets its climatic moments, the audience is rewarded with a sense of triumph, and though it is a small victory in a large and ongoing battle, Hunter’s direction and the cast’s exploration of the play’s themes work well to celebrate the Younger family’s success. In this light, the production of this famed play serves as a ceremony, praising the perseverance of the Black American household, in such a way that allows viewers to review their journey with the hope necessary to continue the push toward liberation. Should it be that the stories of Black Americans and their histories are told with intention as Hunter saw it — not as depression and a struggle against a system, but as the love and passion that binds a family — a better future may result for all.