3,335 articles
Punkie Johnson
Punkie Johnson (Jessica Williams, born 1985, New Orleans) is an American stand-up comedian and actress, SNL cast member seasons 46-49 (2020-24) and the show's first out Black lesbian cast member, known for Love Life, Bottoms, and Space Force.
Punyaprabhav
Punyaprabhav (पुण्यप्रभाव) is a Marathi musical play by Ram Ganesh Gadkari, first staged by Kirloskar Natak Mandali in Mumbai in 1916 and known for the song Nachat Na Gaganat.
Puppet
Puppet: a figure moved by a human operator, animated in forms such as marionette, glove, rod, shadow, and body puppet. Its double vision effect, 6,000-year history, stage revival (War Horse), and uses in therapy distinguish it.
Puppetry
Puppetry (인형극) is theater performed with person-manipulated figures instead of actors; forms include hand, rod, string (marionette), and shadow puppets. It arose before the common era, with hypotheses of Indian or Indian-and-Chinese origin.
Puppetry of the Penis
Puppetry of the Penis, also called the ancient art of genital origami, is an Australian nude comedy show created by Simon Morley and David Friend, debuting at the 1998 Melbourne International Comedy Festival and famous for the Hamburger trick.
Purim-shpil
The Purim-shpil (Yiddish: פּורים־שפּיל) is a comic Yiddish folk play performed by amateur actors during the Jewish festival of Purim, known as the foundation of modern Jewish theater.
Purpose (play)
Purpose is Branden Jacobs-Jenkins's award-winning family drama about the Jaspers, a Black political dynasty. Premiered by Steppenwolf in 2024, it ran on Broadway at Hayes Theater in 2025 and won the Pulitzer Prize and Tony for Best Play.
Pyazat
Pyazat (also written pya zat) is a form of Burmese drama combining spoken dialogue with song, dance, and declaimed verse, from classical court plays to modern melodrama.
Pygmalion (play)
Pygmalion is George Bernard Shaw's 1912 comedy play, first staged in 1913, in which phonetics professor Henry Higgins transforms Cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle into a lady; it inspired the musical My Fair Lady.
Quentin Crisp
Quentin Crisp, born Dennis Charles Pratt (1908–1999), English writer, actor, and artist's model; author of The Naked Civil Servant, subject of the 1975 John Hurt film, star of An Evening with Quentin Crisp in New York from 1978, and a flamboyant queer icon.
Quest Crew
Quest Crew is a Los Angeles hip-hop dance crew named after the Quest Learning Center in Artesia, California; winners of America's Best Dance Crew season 3 (2009) and the 2015 Road to the VMAs reboot, and recipients of the 2016 Creative Arts Emmy for Outstanding Choreography.
R.U.R.
R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots; Rossumovi univerzální roboti) is Karel Čapek's 1920 Czech play whose island factory of organic artificial workers coined the word "robot"; premiered 2 January 1921 in Hradec Králové, ending with humanity's extinction.
Rabindranath Tagore's plays
Rabindranath Tagore's plays are the dramatic works of the Bengali poet and Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore, who wrote over fifty plays between the 1880s and the 1930s.
Rachel Bay Jones
Rachel Bay Jones (born 1969, New York City) is an American stage actress and singer, raised in Boca Raton, Florida. Best known as Heidi Hansen in Dear Evan Hansen, winning the 2017 Tony and 2018 Grammy; also Catherine in the Pippin revival and Marianne in Here We Are.
Rachel Dratch
Rachel Dratch (born 1966, Lexington, MA) is an American comedian and actress, Dartmouth '88, Second City alumna, and SNL cast member 1999–2006 who created Debbie Downer, later nominated for Tonys for POTUS and The Rocky Horror Show.
Rachel Feinstein (comedian)
Rachel Feinstein, American stand-up comedian and actress; Last Comic Standing Season 7 finalist, Thug Tears (2011), Only Whores Wear Purple (2016), Netflix debut Big Guy (2024); frequent Amy Schumer collaborator.
Rachel Gupta
Rachel Gupta (born 2004, Punjab, India) is an Indian model who won Miss Super Talent of the World 2022 and became the first Indian Miss Grand International 2024 winner before resigning the title in May 2025.
Rachel House (actress)
Rachel House (Rachel Jessica Te Ao Maarama House, born 1971) is a New Zealand Māori actor, director, and voice artist known for Whale Rider, Boy, Hunt for the Wilderpeople, Moana's Gramma Tala, Soul, and her 2024 directing debut The Mountain.
Rachel Kaly
Rachel Kaly: queer Middle Eastern American NYC stand-up comedian, writer, and actor; Too Far podcast co-host; creator of Hospital Hour (Chortle's #2 Show 2024, 2026 Off-Broadway run produced by Bob Odenkirk); Claire Coleman in Jury Duty; voice of Trisket in Digman!.
Rachel Parris
Rachel Parris (born 1984, Leicester), English BAFTA-nominated comedian, musician, and author; star of The Mash Report and Late Night Mash, founder of improv show Austentatious, author of Introducing Mrs Collins.
Radio drama
Radio drama, also called audio drama or audio theater, is a purely acoustic performance telling stories through dialogue, music, and sound effects alone, peaking in popularity from 1929 through World War II.
Raja Gemini
Raja Gemini, born Sutan Ibrahim Karim Amrullah (1974), is an American drag queen and makeup artist, winner of RuPaul's Drag Race season 3 (2011), a former America's Next Top Model makeup artist (cycles 4-12), and co-host of Fashion Photo RuView.
Raju Srivastav (राजू श्रीवास्तव)
Raju Srivastav (राजू श्रीवास्तव), born Satya Prakash Srivastava in 1963 in Kanpur, was a Hindi stand-up comedian and actor famous as Gajodhar Bhaiya and for Amitabh Bachchan mimicry; he placed third in The Great Indian Laughter Challenge 2005, later joined the BJP, and died 21 September 2022 at 58.
Rake (stock character)
Rake (stock character), shortened from rakehell, is the witty, licentious upper-class male of English drama, emerging in Restoration comedy (The Man of Mode, The Country Wife), moralized after 1680, and later recast by Hogarth, Richardson, and the Gothic and romance traditions.
Raktakarabi
Raktakarabi (রক্তকরবী, "Red Oleanders") is a 1923 symbolic play by Rabindranath Tagore, set in Yakshapuri, where workers dig gold for a King who has reduced people to numbered instruments.
Rakugo (落語)
Rakugo (落語), Japanese comic storytelling: one seated performer plays all characters with only a fan and hand towel, ending in a punchline (ochi). Two traditions, Edo and Kamigata, over 300 years of history.
Ralph Barbosa
Ralph Barbosa (born 1996) is a Mexican American stand-up comedian from Dallas and Mesquite, Texas, known for laid-back delivery, the Netflix special Cowabunga (2023), the Hulu special Planet Bosa (2025), and his Formula Bean car YouTube channel.
Ralphie May
Ralphie May (Ralph Duren May, 1972-2017), American stand-up comedian, Last Comic Standing season 1 runner-up, four Comedy Central and two Netflix specials, died of cardiac arrest in Las Vegas at 45.
Ramin Karimloo (رامین کریملو)
Ramin Karimloo (رامین کریملو), born 1978 in Tehran, is an Iranian-Canadian musical theatre actor and singer, Olivier and Tony nominee, known for the Phantom in The Phantom of the Opera and Love Never Dies and Jean Valjean in Les Misérables, returning as the Phantom in Shanghai in 2026.
Ramlila
Ramlila, literally "Rama's play," is a traditional performance of the Ramayana staged across northern India each autumn during Dussehra, most often over ten to twelve days.