The Hateful Eighth: An Octoroon and To Tell My Story: A Hamlet Fanfic, reviewed.

Erika Rose and Kathryn Tkel in An Octoroon (Woolly Mammoth).

My review of Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company remount of An Octoroon, the best show I saw in 2016, is here. I should've credited Gwydion Suilebhan (a Woolly staffer, though I've known him longer than he's been on payroll there) for the observation in paragraph four about police body cameras; I couldn't swear I would've thought of that if he hadn't mentioned it to me when we were chatting after the show. He's a playwright and a very smart guy, so if you're going to pilfer ideas, he's a good victim. Also, the 2016 cast isn't quite "fully intact" like I said in paragraph three; Felicia Curry is new to the remount.

I also reviewed To Tell My Story: A Hamlet Fanfic, the latest literary comedy from Washington Post humor columnist Alexandra Petri.

FURTHER READING: My 2013 profile of An Octoroon playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins.

Unconvention Centers: The Welders' Transmission and Solas Nua's Wild Sky, reviewed.

Dylan Morrison Myers and Megan Graves play young revolutionaries in Wild Sky (Solas Nua).

In today's Washington City Paper, I review two new plays being staged in unusual environments. The Welders' Transmission, by playwright/performer Gwydion Suilebhan, is a thoughtful meditation on the hazards of storytelling, while Deirdre Kinahan's Wild Sky is a human-scale look back at a pivotal moment in Ireland's struggle for self-governance. It's also the first show from Solas Nua in five years. I'm glad they're back.