The Irish tenements of the early 1920s were a close-knit and crowded place. Seated cheek-by-jowl at the Washington Shakespeare Company's compelling Juno and the Paycock, Sean O'Casey's tragicomic story of a family's demise, we feel a bit like neighbors at the window. And as we watch the pressures of poverty, civil war and simple bad luck unravel the Boyles, we ... [Read]

A must-see for Wolf Hall groupies (and HBO Tudors hoi palloi), the Washington Shakespeare Company's Mary Stuart is spare, measured and unadorned. For director Colin Hovde, it is more about the language of faces than anything else. Whether caught in the bare-bulbed light of center stage or veering close to our seats, the emphasis here is on what face tells ... [Read]

One of Shakespeare's most complex and fascinating characters is central to Richard III, arguably the bard's most entertaining history play. The Washington Shakespeare Company is a resident company of the new Artisphere complex in Arlington. Its productions are still housed in the same theater as before, though now it's been rechristened the Black Box. To Dec. 12. Artisphere Black Box, ... [Read]