POTUS: Or, Behind Every Great Dumbass are Seven Women Trying to Keep Him Alive is a mouthful of a play title. Fittingly, the characters within are similarly motormouthed and profane. The show comes out guns blazing, beginning mid-conversation with the word “cunt,” which the president has used to describe his wife in a room of VIPs assembled for peace talks that are on the brink of collapsing. The first lady, the chief of staff, the press secretary, and president’s personal secretary scramble to contain the damage while a TIME magazine reporter, the president’s outlaw sister, and the president’s side chick threaten to further the chaos. A madcap romp, POTUS is full of delirious comedy, as well as some sly ideas about the absurdity of political theater and the limitations of girlboss empowerment. 

For POTUS, Arena Stage’s theater in the round becomes a theater in the Oval, with the presidential seal centered on the stage floor, and the audience members become flies on the wall for a national crisis. Since the dawn of the Trump era, art that satirizes our crumbling American empire and historically stupid politics has become ubiquitous, and it’s impossible for Selina Fillinger’s play to avoid comparisons to the similarly foulmouthed political comedy Veep. POTUS could easily feel tired, but it avoids skewering real-life figures, preachiness, or trying to make a hard-hitting point in favor of gleeful silliness.

The unhinged energy largely comes from the joke-a-minute script, which is peppered with scathing one-liners and an almost treasonous disregard for political norms. The cast’s comedic timing and physical comedy skills are as sharp as the dialogue, and they nimbly zip around the stage through ridiculous scenarios at a relentless clip. Single mom reporter Chris (Yesenia Iglesias) wields a breast pump as part prop, part costume. Exasperated Chief of Staff Harriet (Naomi Jacobson) is described by another character as a “human Kegel” even before things go south, and threatens to snap like a rubber band once she’s literally hauling around evidence that could derail her career. No one has to commit harder than Megan Hill as secretary Stephanie, caught in the throes of an accidental drug trip and leading the rest of the cast on a wild chase sequence straight out of Looney Toons. 

There’s a heel turn right before the act break that takes all these already-bubbling ingredients and brings them to a boiling point. A queer romance rekindles and flames out again, priceless West Wing artifacts are destroyed, the country of Bahrain is crushingly humiliated, and the support of an entire voting bloc of women hangs in the balance. A clear, acrylic White House hangs above stage, perhaps an allusion to the glass ceiling of presidential office, and at a moment of crisis begins to tilt and careen, dangerously close to crashing. 

In an ideal model for a nonhierarchical matriarchy, none of the seven women is the lead. It’s tough to balance this many characters and storylines, but the characters are given roughly equal stage time and importance, and all seven actors have moments to shine. Though the lives of all these women revolve to some extent around the president, the man himself rarely appears, and when he does, he’s in the form of a literal dummy. “Why isn’t she president?” is a frequently repeated question, and these characters all have their ways of dealing with the feeling of always being in the shadow of a powerful man. Press Secretary Jean (Natalya Lynette Rathnam) does a little jog in place and shouts affirmations before she has to face the press room, Stephanie power poses and listens to pump-up playlists, and the ultra-accomplished First Lady Margaret (Felicia Curry) practically cracks a tooth trying to smile through the question of why she’s not the one in charge.

POTUS first premiered on Broadway with a star-studded cast in the spring of 2022, but it’s only natural that this presidential play made its way to the nation’s capital. Plenty of women (and men as well) will laugh as they recognize themselves in these characters, and perhaps want to scream when they recognize the sexist reality women—both fictional and real—are trapped in. Arena Stage is hosting special performances geared toward a specific type of overachieving D.C. woman, during which attendees can don their finest Hillary Clinton pantsuit or commemorate Kamala Harris’ birthday—what could be more typically D.C. than that?

POTUS: Or, Behind Every Great Dumbass are Seven Women Trying to Keep Him Alive, written by Selina Fillinger and directed by Margot Bordelon, plays at Arena Stage through Nov. 12. arenastage.org. $41–$99.