"Emily H. Gilson gives Lizzy a wit and independence....The actors navigate this online stage well, interacting as though they were all onstage together. Miss Bennet is a charming production, sure to entertain those familiar with Austen’s novel and newcomers alike."

- DC Metro Theater Arts

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"Playing host at the family gathering, the Darcys are nimbly portrayed by Emily H. Gilson and Alex Kafarakis....Director [Erin] Riley, and assistant director, Dana Woodson, deserve loud, virtual applause for building a structure in which the play constantly and consistently drives forward, while also giving this fine cast ample opportunities to do really fantastic work. Their ability to perform at such a high level is all the more extraordinary given the actors’ isolation from each other. The visual structure is somewhat “Brady Bunch” in the usual Zoom sense, but the cast makes it very easy for viewers to forget that."

"The production is achingly joyful — real comfort food for the spirit, which may be the highest aspiration of a Christmas play."

- MD Theatre Guide

                                                                                                               Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley, Strand Theater Company

                                                                                                               Digital Production, filmed in lockdown, December 2020

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"This is a remarkable production, as full and nuanced as you could hope to see even beyond its circumstances....certainly the finest Shakespeare online during this lockdown, zooming in numerous actors around the world with a full production team, props including swords, gauntlets, and remarkable lighting. Emily Gilson’s Northumberland is a skirling joy as she slices through the pretensions surrounding Richard’s claims. She continually steels towards deposition and outraged pique at Richard’s wrong-doing." - FringeReview UK

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                                                                                                                                                           Richard II: The Show Must Go Online

                                                                                                                                                           UK Production with global cast, May 2020

"Praise is due for Emily Gilson as Brooke, effectively and affectingly navigating her journey as she struggles over whether to publish now and rip the scars open, or wait until her parents are dead." - DC Theatre Scene

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"Outstanding, in-the-moment performances - one of the most intensely-acted shows of the season."

"These characters are real." - DC Metro Theater Arts

 

"Beautifully staged...Gilson's Brooke is at once fragile and the next minute of great emotional strength. The character has suffered from major depression, and Gilson makes us believe that she has been down a bad emotional road for many years."

"'Other Desert Cities' is a road well worth taking." - Maryland Theatre Guide

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                                                                                                                            Other Desert Cities at Peace Mountain Theatre Company

                                                                                                                                                                                                       December 2019

"Emily Gilson's portrayal [of the put-upon governess] makes the viewer want to root for her; Gilson's Roberts is kind, intelligent, and selfless, and it's easy to see why Tom falls for her so quickly, as well as why Dulcie takes advantage of her nature and why Richard takes to her as a companion."

"Quotidian Theatre Company's presentation of The Mollusc is delightful, emotional, and fun." - BroadwayWorld

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★★★★! "Playing the delicately angelic Miss Roberts, Ms. Emily H. Gilson is a superb fit to the role, slipping into the character’s mannerisms, physicality, and overall speech patterns with graceful ease. Gilson does have extreme moments of excitement, typical with ingenue-types of the early 20th century...[and] maintains a steady hand on her Governess sensibilities and her working-class accent.  [It is] noticeable...how effortless Gilson is in maintaining hers."

"Don't be a mollusk. Do something. And by something, I mean venture out to Quotidian Theatre Company’s production of Hubert Henry Davies’ The Mollusc directed by Jack Sbarbori." - TheatreBloom

 

"Quotidian Theatre Company should be on your list. The Mollusc is so full of whimsy and improbability, you may well feel the gentle influence of George Bernard Shaw or Oscar Wilde wafting over you as the farce unfolds....Emily Gilson is well-cast as the gentle and genteel Miss Roberts, the exhausted young woman who wants to make something of herself but realizes that there is no future for her in this circumscribed atmosphere." - DC Metro Theater Arts

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"The actors are charming....Gilson is convincing as the quiet, repressed governess, delivering the most realistic performance of the quartet." - DC Theatre Scene

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"The crisis is set in motion by Miss Roberts...who is self-effacing, grateful for the chance to have landed in a good household, afraid of a future that offers little to gently-bred young ladies who don’t have a dowry, and genuinely kind-hearted and honest...[daring] to dream of more."

"This is an excellent cast who play their roles with subtlety and grace."

"This is a very well-done piece and quietly gets under the skin—you want to see Miss Roberts break free...it's a lovely journey." - Maryland Theatre Guide

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                                                                                                                                                    The Mollusc at Quotidian Theatre Company

                                                                                                                                                                                                                  July 2019

"Emily H. Gilson is luminous as Catherine."

"An intellectually rich, profoundly entertaining show...[with] a beautifully urgent and intimate final scene, an appropriately lyrical interlude. Like the best theater, this production will leave you with a wonderful afterglow." - Maryland Theatre Guide

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★★★★1/2! "An exquisite exploration of human relationships...[with] a raw, pulsating heartbeat of curiosity and intrigue as well as passion and love coursing through it from start to finish."

"Despite Gilson’s modernity, her portrayal of Catherine Givings is of great interest. When she is calmer and more subdued in scenes, there is a desperate curiosity present in her mannerisms; her physique even shifts to show a more timid yet eager type of character. This is experienced early on in the production and again in the final scene, when everything has come undone. Gilson has a fine scene...whilst debating what sort of people they really are— all revolving around an umbrella; she transcends the text with grace to point out its deeper meaning and readily unearths the umbrella analogy in her own charming way. - TheatreBloom

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"Gilson is for all intents and purposes the lead here, as the play focuses primarily on the loneliness and dissatisfaction of her buoyant Mrs. Givings. [She] is convincing as the vivacious Mrs. Givings, straddling the line between the confidence and liveliness her character exudes, while still giving tangible expression to her desperation." - DC Metro Theater Arts

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In The Next Room or the vibrator play at Silver Spring Stage

February 2019

★★★★★! "A feast for the eyes...Prospero’s helpful and whimsical sprite Ariel is shared by three performers, a master stroke of casting on Tom Prewitt’s part. The triple casting – Reginald Richard, Camille Pivetta, and Emily H. Gilson  – contributes to the theatrical magic and the three lithe and energetic individuals work together to enact a cohesive, single character that bonds with Henley’s Prospero in a way I have rarely seen." - DC Theatre Scene

 

"Prospero’s minions may whip up the odd “insubstantial pageant," but the minions themselves are substantial. At least, that’s the case in WSC Avant Bard’s “The Tempest”: Outshining other elements...the depictions of Ariel and Caliban are vivid and intriguing, conjuring up a brave new world....Throughout, Ariel registers as eerie and suitably inhuman." - Celia Wren, The Washington Post

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"A sharp, perceptively wrought production about people shedding their outer skin to reveal another inner, unseen self."

"This Ariel is like an apparition after too long under the sun, or the wrong dosage of drugs that have opened the mind...played by three different actors, each vastly different from the other, yet synchronized."  - DC Metro Theater Arts

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"An energetic, enthusiastic Tempest...further underscor[ing] the female empowerment intrinsic to the play by...casting the sprite Ariel as a blue-hued trio (Emily H. Gilson, Camille Pivetta, and Reginald Richard)." - Broadway World

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"A luminous staging...the production’s spirits are one of the highlights of the show. The choice to embody Ariel, Prospero’s magical assistant, in three actors makes their scenes dynamic." - Maryland Theatre Guide

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                                                                                                                                                                       The Tempest at WSC Avant Bard

                                                                                                                                                                                                                June 2018

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A steampunk aesthetic that’s equal parts KitKatClub and Blade Runner....It all feels more like sneaking into the Cirque du Soleil cast party than attending a play. That confluence of multi-disciplinary talent is a selling point."

   "By design, it’s a more shaded story than the simple Resistance-versus-Republic narrative of their prior effort, [and] a step up in narrative ambition." - With Cabaret Rising, Immersive Theater Comes to D.C., Chris Klimek, Washington City Paper

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★★★★! "Mardi Gras beads and fetishwear abound...a promise of an unsettling and nicely goosepimply beginning."

    "Echoing Star Wars [and] the Second World War, with more than a smidge of modern-day politics." - DC Theatre Scene

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"Jumpy and sexy and dangerous...experimental, hands-on theater." 

    "Sensory overload in the best way...a post-apocalyptic Wonderland that calls to mind video games like Fallout and Bioshock. And, like the best video games, the set pulls you into another world you can see, hear, and touch. For three hours, I forgot that the D.C. of 2018 was just meters above my head. Instead, I had the great luck of meeting the Resistance leaders in 2028."

   "I didn’t regret a single minute of the three hours I spent running around the Dupont Underground."  - DC Metro Theater Arts

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"Immersive theater experience Cabaret Rising opened to a full house last Friday at Dupont Underground. ...The show is considerably stronger than their first production and it’s wonderful to see D.C.’s first immersive theater company hone their craft and fine tune their talents. - Brightest Young Things

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                                                                                                                       Cabaret Rising: One Nation Underground at TBD Immersive

                                                                                                                                                                                                                            February 2018

★★★★★! "A gorgeous and ambitious show....[with] the cast distinct and expressive - all in service of a rich and fascinating world."

    "The “fabric cast” [are] a small army of improvisers who are ready to have fully improvised, in-character scenes with each other or audience members. It’s effortless to get wrapped up in a conversation...that will never happen the same way for anyone else. It's impossible not to be impressed." - DC Theatre Scene

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"Political movements come and go, but the triumph of the human spirit remains."  - "Fully Immersive Theatre: In Cabaret We Trust," On Tap Magazine

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"DC's First Immersive Theatre Company Debuts with 'In Cabaret We Trust,'" - Lori McCue, Washington Post

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                                                                                                                           WORLD PREMIERE: In Cabaret We Trust at TBD Immersive

                                                                                                                                                                                                                         September 2017

★★★★! "Emily Gilson does well as Sister James, the young ingénue trapped between her belief in Father Flynn’s good intentions and her sense of self-preservation in catering to Sister Aloysius’ strategies to expose him....The acting and the venue make it well worth the admission." - DC Theatre Scene

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"If it’s done right, as it is here in Michael Wright’s thoughtful production with SeeNoSun Onstage, you realize it’s about our own obsession with crime and punishment....[Aloysius] makes mincemeat of the young Sister James (the affectingly sincere Emily H. Gilson), whose youthful idealism is shattered in the course of a single brief visit to Sister Aloysius’ office." - DC Metro Theater Arts

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"[The] garden scene with Emily H. Gilson as Sister James exudes such a palpable connection that you feel what they feel in that moment....the complex emotional elixir stirred by this harmonious cast." - Maryland Theatre Guide

HELEN HAYES AWARDS RECOMMENDED

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                                                                                                                                                             DOUBT, A Parable, SeeNoSun Onstage

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   June 2017

"★★★★! Crisp, lively, funny and full of life." - Tim Treanor, DC Theatre Scene

 

"★★★★! You're bound to fall in love....McLindon's iconoclastic play is wish-we-thought-of-it brillant. Where have you been all my life?!" - DC Metro Theater Arts

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"This year's Source Festival...has the kind of energy that can only be wrought by combining new talent with established artists to collaborate on new work." -  Maryland Theatre Guide

 

"I’m going to the Source Festival. I don’t care what’s in it, or when it is, I’m going. Going to the Source Festival is like winning one of those mysterious boxes at the County Fair." - Tim Treanor's "Won't miss shows for this season," DC Theatre Scene

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                               WORLD PREMIERE ORIGINAL CAST: I DON'T KNOW & THE FERBERIZING OF CORAL - Secrets & Sound: Six 10-Minute Plays

                                                                                                                                                                                                Source Festival 2016