The yea! yea! sisterhoodBy Peter MarksThursday, July 19, 2012  In this age of merry mashups, few fusions have offered quite as much potential for delectable irony on a stage as the idea of the three singing Bronte sisters.  Actually, there was a brother, as well, in this 19th-century retinue of literary siblings, and bless his heart, Branwell Bronte gets equal billing with his more famous sisters in “The Brontes,” a delightful musical satire at the Capital Fringe Festival, brought to you by the comedically enterprising folks at Dizzy Miss Lizzie’s Roadside Revue.  Set to the bluegrass and rock-inflected compositions of Steve McWilliams and Debra Buonaccorsi, “The Brontes” is an impressive vehicle on which to travel into Dizzy Miss Lizzie’s imagination. In fact, at less than 90 minutes, the production and its cast of nine -- several of whom do double duty as band members -- hardly exhaust an audience’s appetite for the juicy amusements they brandish.  Mind you, I saw “The Brontes” under a sweltering tent on a blistering afternoon, when you could have poached a salmon on a bare seat. Yes, I wanted to escape the oppressive atmosphere, but not even under the threat of imminent heat stroke did I consider missing a moment. Thanks to directors Rick Hammerly and Buonaccorsi and a cadre of marvelous actor-entertainers -- among them, Dani Stoller, Matthew Schleigh, Laura Keena and Buonaccorsi herself -- cool was the prevailing theatrical front.  These four performers play the Brontes, with Stoller as Emily (author of “Wuthering Heights”) and Buonaccorsi portraying Charlotte (“Jane Eyre”). Through a dozen songs (and a series of, yes, artful metaphors), family troubles spill out, premature deaths are recounted and plots of famous novels reenacted. The tragic epiphany of the disappointed Anne Bronte is hauntingly rendered by Keena in the show’s most resonant number, “Anne’s Song,” while Schleigh brings charm and technical skill to the rock ballad “God Knows.”  Gillian Shelly and Jordan Klein provide potent turns as two of the carnival figures who help shepherd the narrative, and designer Maria Royals mashes things up vibrantly, too, in the eye-catching get-ups she assembles from three centuries of fashion. It’s all put together with so much wit and panache that one hopes the revue, living up to its name, gets to take “The Brontes” on the road.  By Peter MarksWednesday, July 18, 2012  In this age of merry mashups, few fusions have offered quite as much potential for delectable irony on a stage as the idea of the three singing Bronte sisters.  Actually, there was a brother, as well, in this 19th century retinue of literary siblings, and bless his heart, Branwell Bronte gets equal billing with his more famous sisters in “The Brontes,” a delightful musical satire at the Capital Fringe Festival, brought to you by the comedically enterprising folks at Dizzy Miss Lizzie’s Roadside Revue.  Set to the bluegrass and rock-inflected compositions of Steve McWilliams and Debra Buonaccorsi, “The Brontes” is an impressive vehicle on which to travel into Dizzy Miss Lizzie’s imagination. In fact, at under 90 minutes, the production and its a cast of nine -- several of whom do double duty as band members -- hardly exhaust an audience’s appetite for the juicy amusements they brandish.  Mind you, I saw “The Brontes” under a sweltering tent on a blistering afternoon, when you could have poached a salmon on a bare seat. Yes, I wanted to escape the oppressive atmosphere, but not even under the threat of imminent heat stroke did I consider missing a moment. Thanks to directors Rick Hammerly and Buonaccorsi and a cadre of marvelous actor-entertainers -- among them, Dani Stoller, Matthew Schleigh, Laura Keena and Buonaccorsi herself -- cool was the prevailing theatrical front.  These four performers play the Brontes, with Stoller as Emily (author of “Wuthering Heights”) and Buonaccorsi portraying Charlotte (“Jane Eyre”). Through a dozen songs (and a series of, yes, artful metaphors), family troubles spill out, premature deaths are recounted and plots of famous novels reenacted. The tragic epiphany of the disappointed Anne Bronte is hauntingly rendered by Keena in the show’s most resonant number, “Anne’s Song,” while Schleigh brings charm and technical skill to the rock ballad “God Knows.”  Gillian Shelly and Jordan Klein provide potent turns as two of the carnival figures who help shepherd the narrative, and designer Maria Royals mashes things up vibrantly, too, in the eye-catching get-ups she assembles from three centuries of fashion. It’s all put together with so much wit and panache that one hopes the revue, living up to its name, gets to take “The Brontes” on the road.  Fringe review: 'The Pundit' By Jane HorwitzTuesday, July 17, 2012  Feigning expertise when you have none can land you in quicksand, whether you’re puffing up a resume or playing a know-it-all on cable television. Actor/playwright John Feffer’s “The Pundit,” which has three more Capital Fringe Festival performances at the Goethe Institute, takes that idea and burnishes it into a Washington-savvy satire. After an hour, though, the piece morphs into a thriller and founders.  A Fringe veteran (“Krapp’s Last PowerPoint,” “The Bird,” “Edible Rex”), Feffer belongs to the punditocracy himself. Having opined as a Korea expert, he now shepherds the work of other wonks as a staffer at the Institute for Policy Studies.  In “The Pundit,” Feffer plays Peter Peters, a foreign policy analyst from a fictional think tank. Peters has a high self-regard and a knack for saying little while emitting torrents of words. He’s far too important to pick up his son (Matthew Ancarrow) at school. He berates his young assistant to the point of verbal abuse and responds to interviewers’ questions with hollow pedantry.  A tragic fall awaits such a man, and it comes when he riffs ignorantly about a terror attack in a part of the world far outside his ken. Peters shovels it high, then gets a call from the leader (Sean Coe) of the terror group in question. His hubris plays right into the group’s hands.  Feffer’s witty but repetitive script requires a red pencil, and the multimedia staging (by Doug Krehbel) needs a brisker pace. Having Feffer always seated and addressing the audience, as if we are the camera lens, the radio mike, the wife (Emily Morrison), the assistant or the terrorist at the other end of his cell phone, gets awfully static. You want him to interact with the cast. As an actor, too, Feffer delivers one-liners with ease, but not the emotion needed when the terrorist threatens him.  “The Pundit” deflates its target with a sharp satiric pin in that first hour. Later, when it’s time to jolt the gut or pierce the heart, its aim is shakier.
The Pundit on washingtonpost.com's Going Out Guide; you source for performing arts and live plays in Washington, DC