Juan Francisco Villa

Currently in previews, Duncan Macmillan and Jonny Donahoe’s Every Brilliant Thing opens September 14, 2023, at the Geffen. Colm Summers directs Daniel K. Isaac in this comic view on depression and suicide. Daniel keeps it in the same light vein in answering my queries.

Next up at the Kirk Douglas Theatre, Center Theatre Group (in association with IAMA Theatre Company) present Alexis Scheer’s Our Dear Dead Drug Lord opening August 27, 2023 (already in previews). CTG’s associate artistic director directs the cast of Ashley Brooke, Aliyah Camacho, Samantha Wynette Miller, Coral Peña, Lilian Rebelo and Juan Francisco Villa. The very busy Samantha squeezed some time from her preview rehearsals to answer a few of my queries.

Named a New York Times Critics Pick, “Our Dear Dead Drug Lord” by playwright Alexis Scheer, directed by Center Theatre Group Associate Artistic Director Lindsay Allbaugh, and produced in association with IAMA Theatre Company, comes to the Kirk Douglas Theatre from August 20 to September 17, 2023 with the press opening on August 27.  Get a first look at the production!

Be the first to see the cast photos of OUR DEAR DEAD DRUG LORD at Center Theatre Group. Meet the talented actors who will be performing in this highly anticipated production. Get a sneak peek of the show and discover the incredible talent on stage.

Rehearsals are underway for Our Dear Dead Drug Lord at Center Theatre Group's Kirk Douglas Theatre. Check out photos from the first day of rehearsal here!

Named a New York Times Critics Pick, “Our Dear Dead Drug Lord” by playwright Alexis Scheer, directed by Center Theatre Group Associate Artistic Director Lindsay Allbaugh, and produced in association with IAMA Theatre Company, comes to the Kirk Douglas Theatre from August 20 to September 17, 2023 with the press opening on August 27.

Being presented as digital shorts, the next three of 12 winning plays by young playwrights aged 15–19 will be available to stream on Vimeo July 15–21. The plays are I'll Love You Forever by Spencer Emerson Opal-Levine (age 19, from Sarasota, FL); Gray Area by Simone Chaney (age 17, from Interlochen, MI); and The Legend of Caeneus by Zander Pryor (age 19, from Bronxville, NY).

Art House Productions has announced casting for the Virtual INKubator New Play Festival starting tonight, Monday, May 3 through Wednesday, May 19 online via Zoom.

The multicamera, virtually produced reading of Luis Alfaro's “Oedipus El Rey,” premieres November 13, 2020 at 5 p.m. Pacific. The modern adaptation of a Greek classic is part of the “The Greek Trilogy of Luis Alfaro” which is presented on Center Theatre Group's Digital Stage in partnership with The Getty.

During this uncertain time for the nation and the arts community, 1st Stage remains committed to creating diverse, modern work by leading playwrights and performers. Despite the prolonged theatre closure necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic, the company delights in bringing you the same quality of beautiful, emotional, relatable stories that you could have otherwise seen on our stage.

Tonight, at a celebration honoring theatre excellence on stages across the Washington area, theatre artists, administrators, patrons, and special guests gathered in the National Theatre's Helen Hayes Gallery for theatreWashington's announcement of nominees for the 36th Annual Helen Hayes Awards, which will be presented on Monday, May 18 at an event at the Anthem.

To mark the 20th anniversary of the deadly shooting at Columbine High School, 1st Stage brings us a columbinus that, tragically, is as frightening, significant, and topical today as ever before. In the two decades since the massacre at Columbine High-the deadliest school shooting at the time-we have now experienced tragedies at Virginia Tech, Sandy Hook, Parkland, and more. columbinus mixes documentary fact with fiction to delve into the alienation, social pressure, intimidation, and rage of adolescent life in high school.

Coinciding with the 20th anniversary of the tragic 1999 massacre at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, this docudrama combines fact and fiction to illuminate the dark realities of adolescence. Weaving together excerpts of real interviews with parents, survivors, and community leaders and powerful characterizations of contemporary teens, columbinus thoughtfully explores the Columbine shooting and the conversations that continue to this day. The New York Post hailed columbinus as 'a powerful and important piece about the churning rage that's all too likely to bubble over again.'

Coinciding with the 20th anniversary of the tragic 1999 massacre at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, this docudrama combines fact and fiction to illuminate the dark realities of adolescence. Weaving together excerpts of real interviews with parents, survivors, and community leaders and powerful characterizations of contemporary teens, columbinus thoughtfully explores the Columbine shooting and the conversations that continue to this day. The New York Post hailed columbinus as "a powerful and important piece about the churning rage that's all too likely to bubble over again."

From the co-creator of the Academy Award-winning film Moonlight comes a profoundly compelling story of family, devotion, and belonging. Deep in the Louisiana bayou, the hardworking and steady, Ogun Size, is reunited with his aimless younger brother recently released from prison. Flights of poetry, music, and West African mythology combine in a one-of-a-kind experience that delivers "the greatest piece of writing by an American playwright under 30 in a generation or more" (The Chicago Tribune).

1st Stage, Tysons Corner's award-winning professional theatre, announces the extension of their critically-acclaimed production of A Civil War Christmas: An American Musical Celebration until December 30.

It's 1864 and Washington, D.C. is settling down to the coldest Christmas Eve in years. "History lessons and holiday warmth sit cozily alongside each other" (The New York Times) in this pageant of carols by Paula Vogel, the Pulitzer Prize-winning writer of Indecent. Stories of many intertwining lives- spanning from the battlegrounds of Northern Virginia to the halls of the White House- demonstrate that the gladness of one's heart is the best gift of all. This "rich and moving play with music" (Variety) is a treat the whole family will enjoy.

It's 1864 and Washington, D.C. is settling down to the coldest Christmas Eve in years. "History lessons and holiday warmth sit cozily alongside each other" (The New York Times) in this pageant of carols by Paula Vogel, the Pulitzer Prize-winning writer of Indecent. Stories of many intertwining lives- spanning from the battlegrounds of Northern Virginia to the halls of the White House- demonstrate that the gladness of one's heart is the best gift of all. This "rich and moving play with music" (Variety) is a treat the whole family will enjoy.

The One-Minute Play Festival (#1MPF) (Dominic D'Andrea, Producing Artistic Director; Caitlin Wees, Associate Artistic Director) and INTAR (Lou Moreno, Artistic Director; John McCormack, Executive Director) continue their acclaimed collaboration with The 7th Annual INTAR One-Minute Play Festival, with part of the proceeds to benefit UNIT 52, INTAR's training program for emerging artists. After seven years of partnership that celebrates Latinx ideas and narratives, the festival welcomes the next generation of 1MPF artists, who join some of our alumni cohort.

Have you ever wished for one more chance to say something to someone who has passed away suddenly? What if there was an organization that could arrange for messages to be delivered to those who have died by pairing you up with someone terminally ill who agrees to deliver that message once they have passed on? Would you do it? And what if it was extraordinarily expensive with no way of knowing if your message was ever received? That is the simple magical premise of THE UNTRANSLATABLE SECRETS OF NIKKI CORONA, a new play written by Obie Award-winning playwright Jose Rivera, premiering at the Geffen Playhouse through October 7.