Olney Theatre Center

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In the News . . .

REVIEW: ‘The 39 Steps’: Raucous hilarity reigns at Olney

THE GAZETTE • MAY 8, 2012 • BY LARRY BANGS

There is something to be said for the healing powers of laughter. If you are in need of some therapy to lift your mood, I heartily recommend 2 hours and 15 minutes of comic mayhem currently playing at the Olney Theatre Center.

“The 39 Steps” began life as a murder mystery written by John Buchanan and converted in 1935 into an Alfred Hitchcock film. It took Patrick Barlow, a British playwright and comedian of some small renown, to envision this somewhat weighty material into a one-ring farcical circus with four actors occupying somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 roles. No small trick when one of the actors portrays only one character throughout the evening and a second actor, only a handful.

REVIEW: ‘The 39 Steps’ at The Olney Theatre Center

DC METRO THEATER ARTS • APRIL 24, 2012 • BY AMANDA GUNTHER

Murder! Mayhem! Mystery! Clowns? This exciting action-packed thriller could be none other than The 39 Steps presented at The Olney Theatre Center. Adapted by Patrick Barlow based on the movies of Alfred Hitchcock, this madcap adventure is sure to keep audiences everywhere on the edge of their seats. Imagine yourself an ordinary man who is bored out of his mind so he takes a night out at the theatre. And then he takes a strange woman home from the theatre. And then she gets murdered in his apartment and now the police are after him for murder. Along the way he gets tangled up in an international espionage and then manages to tangle himself into the most dangerous thing on the planet— love. The show is a roaring good time with four actors taking to the stage in over 150 zany characters.

REVIEW: "The 39 Steps" at Olney Theatre Center

The spy thriller gets an engaging and entertaining staging in this farce-inspired production.

WASHINGTONIAN • APRIL 24, 2012 • BY JANE HORWITZ

With tongues planted firmly in cheeks, the four savvy actors in The 39 Steps, running at Olney Theatre Center through May 20, turn the classic espionage thriller into a pretty consistently delicious British-style farce. This reimagining of the 1935 Hitchcock film (and the 1915 novel by John Buchan on which it was based) originated in Britain in 2005, then made its way to London's West End and won the 2007 Olivier Award for Best New Comedy. Some Washington-area theatergoers may have caught the American touring company, which dropped briefly into the Warner Theatre two years ago. Or perhaps they saw it on Broadway in 2008 or '09. The show won Tony and Drama Desk Awards for design, as well as a Drama Desk nod as a "unique theatrical experience."