Heal Thyself: The Critic and The Real Inspector Hound, reviewed.

The cast of The Real Inspector Hound (Scott Suchman/Shakespeare Theatre Co.)

I couldn't make the Monday-night press premiere of Shakespeare Theatre Company's twofer of Richard Brinsley Sheridan's The Critic and Tom Stoppard's The Real Inspector Hound last week, as I am teaching the Sweet Science on Monday nights this season. But I caught up with the show later in the week and my Washington City Paper review went up this afternoon. Stoppard's play, especially, makes the pain of hackery burn more than usual.

When You're a Jet Something Something: West Side Story, reviewed.

(Signature Theatre/Christopher Mueller)

I brought my folks to Signature Theatre's reverent, rapturous production of the Broadway classic West Side Story the week before Christmas, but due to vagaries related to two issues falling on holidays between then and now, my Washington City Paper review is only now surfacing. I filed on time, dammit. At least I think I did. Who can remember anything from before Christmas now? Holiday-time usually brings a conventional but deeply satisfying revival of a proven crowd favorite, and this winter, West Side Story is the one to beat.

For what it's worth, the first time I heard "America" was when Bono was singing a snippet of it during "Bullet the Blue Sky" on U2's PopMart Tour in 1997.

Faking and Baking: Stage Kiss and Holiday Memories, reviewed.

They can't all be winners, not even shows from playwrights, directors, and actors whose work you often love. Round House Theatre's new production of Sarah Ruhl's Stage Kiss was a bigger disappointment to me given its pedigree than was WSC Avant Bard's Holiday Memories, but I can't say either one blew my Christmas stockings off. As ever, your mileage may vary.

No More: Oliver!, reviewed.

Jake Heston Miller is Oliver! (Margot Schulman)

It's already been three weeks since I saw Arena Stage's new production of Oliver! — Lionel Bart's beloved 1960 musical adaptation of Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist — but for various page-cutting reasons, my review did not run in the Washington City Paper until this week's issue. Somehow I got through it without mentioning that Jeff McCarthy, who plays Fagan, was in RoboCop 2.

How You Like Them Apples? Sorry and Regular Singing, reviewed.

Sarah Marshall, Elizabeth Pierotti, Rick Foucheux, and Kimberly Schraf in The Apple Family Cycle, part the second, at Studio Theatre. (Allie Dearie)

My review of Sorry and Regular Singing, the latter two entries in Richard Nelson's Apple Family quartet, is in today's Washington City Paper. I reviewed the first pair, That Hopey Changey Thing and Sweet and Sad, when the same director and cast staged them here in Washington two years ago; see here. If I've little more to say now than I said then, it's only because the magnificent strengths of the whole are also the strengths of its magnificent component parts.

Petty Hurts: Girlstar and Avenue Q, reviewed.

In this week's Washington City Paper, I size up a pair of musicals: Signature Theatre's Girlstar is a confused mess borne aloft by a strong cast, and Constellation Theatre's revival of the hit Sesame Street parody Avenue Q is funnier and more soulful than The Muppets. (The dour 2015 version, not The Muppet Show.) More words, if not necessarily more insight, on these subjects here and here.

Arboreal Talk: Keegan Theatre's The Magic Tree and Molotov Theatre's Lovecraft: Nightmare Suite, reviewed.

Brianna Letourneau and Scott Ward Abernethy in Keegan Theatre's The Magic Tree.

In this week's Washington City Paper, available wherever Washington's free alt-weekly is sold, I review the well-performed Keegan Theatre production of Ursula Rani Sarma's perplexing The Magic Tree, plus Molotov Theatre's Lovecraft: Nightmare Suite, adapted from a half-dozen short stories by the celebrated author of chillers, Hey Probably Lovecraft.