A 'Spamalot' Sidekick's Moment to Shine

"There is so much more violence done from adults to children than from the other way around. And if we start looking where the violence starts . . . that was the important thing in this play for me," Corthron explains. "Violence does not come in a vacuum. I don't believe that children are just born bad. . . . It has to do with society and the world you've laid out for them."

Corthron, who grew up in Cumberland, Md., and attended the University of Maryland at College Park before grad school at Columbia University, doesn't feel her play is without hope for Prix, who ages from 16 to 30 and seems poised to thaw from inhumane to humane, as Corthron puts it, by play's end.

Hope is essential if you want audiences to act on what they learn, Corthron says. If the audience files out feeling "all they can do is throw up their hands in despair, then there will be no action . . . but if you provide a little hope, that can actually provide some sort of impetus for them to do something," she says.

The busy and oft-commissioned playwright makes no bones about her zest for digging into political issues in her plays. She has tackled tense police-community relations ("Force Continuum"), craven journalism ("Moot the Messenger") and pollution ("Splash Hatch on the E Going Down") and is working on pieces about the politics of water around the world and on colonial and modern Liberia.

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¿ The age of Shakespeare and Elizabeth I will be the centerpiece of this year's Christmas Revels, a theater piece with music celebrating the winter solstice and encouraging audience participation in carol-singing at Lisner Auditorium Dec. 8, 9 and 14-16. Visit http://www.revelsdc.org or call 800-595-4849.

¿ American Century Theater will do an old-style radio version of "A Christmas Carol" as a free hour-long teleconference Dec. 16 at 8 p.m. Callers can access the performance by calling 866-212-0875, then entering the passcode 4930306# before 8 p.m. Visit http://www.americancentury.org or check the theater's message line at 703-998-4555.

¿ The Helen Hayes Awards organization is offering holiday gift certificates. The $20 Theatre TixCertificates, accepted at more than 40 area theaters, are available at http://www.helenhayes.org or 202-337-4572.