A Night With Prince, Girls Rock!, and More: City Lights for July 18–24
Thursday: Under the Cherry Moon at Franklin Park In a city with literally hundreds of outdoor movie night options, it’s somewhat surprising there aren’t more Prince-themed options. Sure, it’s not unlikely to see Purple Rain on a lawn near you, which makes sense because it’s Prince’s best movie, but the unlikely showing of the artist’s…
Byrdland Records Helps Connect Music Fans to Local Artists One Membership at a Time
The bright tambourines of the Jackson 5’s “I’ll Be There” can be heard from most corners of Devry and Sean Jones’ Manor Park apartment. The song plays from a tucked-away corner where the couple’s record player sits atop IKEA shelves holding more than 3,700 albums. Putting on a record as the two prepare dinner is…
Laugh Audibly: The Colored Museum Confronts the Absurd Contradictions of What it Means to be Black in America
“You are allowed to laugh audibly” reads a note from playwright Dominique Morisseau’s “Rules of Engagement, excerpted in Studio Theatre’s program for The Colored Museum. Morisseau’s note is a reminder to audiences that, despite the toxicity they might encounter in the 11 vignettes that compose George C. Wolfe’s play, the story is fundamentally satirical. Arguably…
Book Fair, Brutalism, and Progression: City Lights for July 11–17
Daily: Progression at Multiple Exposures Gallery It’s a project with a design so convoluted that few would dare attempt it twice within nine months. But the photographers of Multiple Exposures Gallery are game for another Progressions exhibit, in which 15 members contribute 45 images in sequence, thematically playing off the previous image with either a…
Longlegs Gives the Uncanny Feeling You’re Bearing Witness to Actual Evil
The new serial killer film Longlegs is a brilliant exercise in misdirection. Sometimes it’s formal, like when certain camera compositions obscure a character so haunting they’re beyond basic human understanding. Sometimes the misdirection is in the script itself—a riff on ’90s thrillers such as The Silence of the Lambs and Seven—because writer and director Osgood…
Beautiful Makes One Thing Clear: Carole King and Cynthia Weil Paved the Way for Today’s Women Chart-Toppers
Taylor Swift was still in her Red era when Beautiful: The Carole King Musical opened on Broadway in 2014. The high-end jukebox musical about the intersection of songwriting and relationships hits differently a decade later, in the golden age of Spotify. Today listeners analyze song lyrics like Bletchley Park codebreakers. Is Joe Alwyn “the smallest…
Marissa Higgins’ Extreme Talent Is on Display in Her Novel A Good Happy Girl
Though she no longer calls D.C. home, writer Marissa Higgins knows her way around the District, where she lived in various Northwest neighborhoods from 2014 to 2020. The city even celebrated her work in 2020 with a grant for her nonfiction writing, which has appeared in numerous publications including The Atlantic, Salon, and Slate. Unfortunately,…
Step Afrika!’s Remounted Migration: Reflections on Jacob Lawrence Is Still Good, Could Be Better
In the 13 years since D.C.-based Step Afrika! debuted Migration: Reflections on Jacob Lawrence, the field of percussive dance has grown by leaps and bounds. Black performing artists have benefited from an influx of support, including millions from philanthropist MacKenzie Scott. Meanwhile, many historically White arts organizations are continuing to increase racial diversity, both onstage…
Forget the Fourth: DC Does Dischord, Sixth Sense in a Cemetery, and More City Lights for July 3–10
Friday: Yesterday & Today: DC Does Dischord Release Party at the Black Cat D.C.-based label For the Love of Records is putting on a show to celebrate the release of their new compilation album. Entitled Yesterday & Today: DC Does Dischord, the LP is a tribute to the area’s hardcore punk heritage by some of…
The Creative Partnership Behind Team Rayceen Productions
The story of Team Rayceen Productions, a local advocacy and events organization that was honored earlier this year when the city declared March 18 Team Rayceen Day, begins with a couch. The year was 2014, and the couch was in the since-shuttered Liv Nightclub, where queer activist and noted socialite Rayceen Pendarvis was setting up…
Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.