Dark Lady: A Musical Theater Work
Book, Lyrics, and Music by Alexa Babakhanian
Directed by Rebecca Martínez
Booking and details
Dates Sat, Jan 24, 2026, 2pm
Venue Folger Theatre
Tickets $20
Please note: Children under the age of 4 are not permitted.
NOTE: This event has been rescheduled to Saturday, January 24, at 2pm. It was originally scheduled for Sunday, January 25, at 3pm.
What would happen if it were discovered that Amelia Bassano, a Venetian Jew and the first woman poet published in England, was the real author of Shakespeare’s plays? And what if this literary secret was revealed by Elizabethan characters existing in a modern-day alternate reality?
Discover the Dark Lady, Shakespeare’s muse in his Sonnets, who has been hiding in plain sight for over 400 years. Alexa Babakhanian’s humorous, whimsical musical creates a dynamic score of beatboxing, hip hop, classical, and pop music to highlight the interplay between these two great dramatists and poets.
After the reading, current Folger Long-Term Public Humanities Fellow JaMeeka Holloway, who is an award-winning director, producer, and cultural strategist based in Durham, North Carolina, will lead a conversation with members of the creative team and cast.
How to attend the festival
Individual events – $20
Reading Room Festival All-Access Pass – $125
Access to all staged readings, panel discussions, workshops, and community celebrations included in the Festival.
Students – Free admission to readings and conversations
Admitted free one-half hour before event start time, with a valid ID.
Cast
Joél Acosta*
Joél Acosta (Town Crier and others) Folger Theatre: debut. Regional: Old Globe Theatre: Regency Girls (world premiere); The New Theatre: Leveling Up! Off-Broadway: The Great Gatsby Immersive; Pregones/PRTT: Aloha Boricua; 59E59: The Greatest Hits Down Route 66; The Public Theater: The Comedy of Errors. International: Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre: Richard II. Television: FBI: Most Wanted, The Food That Built America. www.joelaacosta.com/ @joelacostagram
Sadie Koopman
Sadie Koopman (Barmaid, Groupie 2, Harriet Harmon, and others) Folger Theatre: debut; NextStop Theatre Company: Dream Hou$e; Shakespeare Theatre Company: As You Like It; Shakespeare Theatre Company’s Academy of Classical Acting: Romeo and Juliet, The Rover, Two Gentlemen of Verona, The Odyssey. Regional: Quintessence Theatre: The Pirates of Penzance; Lyric Theatre of Oklahoma: Rocky Horror Picture Show. Awards: National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) Musical Theater Finalist. Education: MFA in Classical Acting (Shakespeare Theatre Company’s Academy of Classical Acting), BM in Music Theatre and Vocal Performance (Oklahoma City University). @sadie.koopman sadiekoopman.com
Lord Hunsdon, Earl of Essex, Celebrity Actor, Dr. Lopez, Director of Shakespeare Plays, Robert Cecil
Trevor McGhie*
Trevor McGhie*
Trevor McGhie (Lord Hunsdon, Earl of Essex, Celebrity Actor, Dr. Lopez, Director of Shakespeare Plays, Robert Cecil) Folger Theatre: debut. Regional: La Jolla Playhouse: The Outsiders; Capital Repertory Theatre: Fly. Off-Broadway: The Public Theater/Shakespeare in the Park: As You Like It; Sea Dog Theater: Awake and Sing. @TrevorJMcGhie
Rachael Small
Rachael Small (Natty Nit, Cherie Blair, Amal Clooney, Lady Pembroke, Patron 2) Folger Theatre: Merry Wives of Windsor; Kennedy Center: Go Dog,Go!/ Ve Perro, Ve!; GALA Hispanic Theatre: Las Hermanas Palacios, Momia en el Closet, BotiQUIN de Boleros; Synetic Theater: The Tempest, Phantom of the Opera, Dracula, Beauty and the Beast, Midsummer Night’s Dream; Taffety Punk Theatre Company: Macbeth; Iron Crow Theatre: Act of God; Arkansas Repertory Theatre: Evita, Death of a Salesman; Classical Theater of Harlem: The Tempest. @miss.rachael.k.small
Dani Stoller*
Dani Stoller (Amelia Bassano) Folger Theatre: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, As You Like It, District Merchants; Signature Theatre: Ragtime (Helen Hayes Nomination: Best Supporting Performer), Which Way to the Stage; Arena Stage: My Body, No Choice (Helen Hayes Nomination: Best Supporting Performer); Olney Theatre Center: The Crucible, The Joy That Carries You, The Thanksgiving Play; Theater J: Hester Street (Helen Hayes Nomination: best supporting performer), Prayer for the French Republic (Helen Hayes Nomination: Best Supporting Performer). Off-Broadway: 59E59 Theaters: This Much I Know.
Holly Twyford*
Holly Twyford (Queen Elizabeth, Marissa Lord, Celebrity Actress) Folger Theatre: All’s Well That Ends Well, As You Like It, The Merchant of Venice, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Much Ado About Nothing, The Taming of the Shrew, Twelfth Night, The Two Gentlemen of Verona (Helena Hayes Award), Hamlet, Othello, Romeo and Juliet (Helen Hayes Award), Arcadia, Melissa Arctic, Second Shepherd’s Play, Orestes: A Tragic Romp, Mary Stuart, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, King John; Over eighty productions at DC Area theater including: Shakespeare Theatre Company, Studio Theatre, Woolly Mammoth, Round House Theatre, and others. Awards & Affiliations: 5 Helen Hayes Awards, Emery Battis Award for Acting Excellence, Lunt-Fontanne Fellow, Studio Theatre Cabinet Member, Ford’s Associate Artist.
Creative team
Alexa Babakhanian
Alexa Babakhanian (Playwright – Dark Lady) Folger Theatre: debut. With degrees from Juilliard (BM, MM), award-winning multi-hyphenate Alexa Babakhanian champions the unrepresented through her artistic output. Her work I Care Do You?” in collaboration with Malala was presented at the United Nations, while her song “A Million Me’s” was presented at the Women’s March on Washington. The Women of Don Quixote featured Alexa’s song cycle and her opera Lady Liberty premiered at Lincoln Center in 2020 while she was artist in residence.
Dark Lady was presented as a reading at the Illinois Shakespeare Festival. Dark Lady was presented as a one act at the Minnesota Fringe Festival with Lori Parquet (Suffs, As You Like It, The Public Theater) playing both Shakespeare and Amelia Bassano. Dark Lady was presented as a reading at the Lyric Theater at University of Illinois under the direction of Julie Gunn. Dark Lady was featured on NPR.
Rebecca Martínez**
Rebecca Martínez (Director – Dark Lady) Folger Theatre: debut. Regional: Baltimore Center Stage: Miss You Like Hell; Geva Theatre: Sancocho, In Her Bones; Two River Theater: Living and Breathing; Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center: Anna in the Tropics (Henry Award for Directing); Syracuse Stage/ Geva Theatre: Somewhere Over the Border; Repertory Theatre of St. Louis: Mojada: A Medea in Los Angeles. Off-Broadway: Mobile Unit, The Public Theater: Much Ado About Nothing, The Comedy of Errors (LATA Award winner; Drama Desk nomination) WP Theater/ Spark Theatrical: Dirty Laundry; WP Theater/ Colt Coeur: Bite Me; WP Theater/ Latinx Playwrights Circle/ Sol Project: Sancocho; Radical Evolution/ Working Theater: Songs About Trains. Artist-in-Residence at Radical Evolution; SEED Directing Commission at Public Theater. https://www.rebeccamartinez.org/
JaMeeka Holloway
2025-26 Long-term Public Humanities Fellow
Linguistic Hierarchies: Gullah-Geechee x Shakespearean English (What Language Remembers)
What Language Remembers is an interdisciplinary exploration of the historical, performative, and linguistic intersections between Gullah-Geechee and Shakespearean English, aimed at elevating the Gullah-Geechee tradition through a critical lens. Drawing on historical research, linguistic and phonetic analysis, and storytelling practices, the project highlights how both systems—one shaped by the survival strategies of enslaved Africans, the other by the literary ambitions of Renaissance England – use rhythm, tone, and narrative to transmit identity, memory, and resistance.
Kate Kilbane*
Kate Kilbane (Production Stage Manager) Folger Theatre: Folger Consort; Our Verse in Time to Come, Amadeus, Henry IV Part 1; Olney Theatre Center: Hello Dolly, Kim’s Convenience, Waitress. Signature Theatre: Primary Trust; Imagination Stage: Corduroy; Shakespeare Theatre Company: The Tempest Free For All; The Kennedy Center, Family Theater: The Watsons Go to Birmingham-1963. The Kennedy Center: First You Dream, Follies, The Lisbon Traviata, Ragtime. 13 productions at Ford’s Theatre and 15 productions at Theater J. Regional: Williamstown Theatre Festival: 2024 Fridays@3 Reading Series; Everyman Theatre: The Chinese Lady, Jump, Sense and Sensibility; Contemporary American Theatre Festival: The Overview Effect, 2022 Repertory Season (Swing SM).
Alexus Wells
Alexus Wells (Production Assistant) Folger Theatre: Julius X: A Re-envisioning of The Tragedy of Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare.
*Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States
**Member of Stage Directors and Choreographers Society
Related
Q&A with Alexa Babakhanian
Alexa Babakhanian shares the history of Dark Lady: A Musical Theater Work, her Broadway aspirations for the play, and why she was drawn to Amelia Bassano as a possible author for Shakespeare’s works.