In the latest presentation in the Englert Theatre's virtual Storytellers series, professional actor and playwright Katie Colletta will deliver a crash course in children's entertainment with her April 24 program Youth Storytelling Workshop, a program designed for participants to get their creative juices flowing with interactive games creative ways to bring stories to life both on the page and on the stage.
This feature lists all headlines with links to the articles by date/time published online by Quad Cities-area media outlets and the state-politics sections of the Des Moines Register and the State Journal-Register.
Some of the most fascinating and beautiful edifices in all of Europe will be explored and celebrated on April 25 when historian and lecturer Russell Baldner delivers the virtual program German Architecture in the Saxony Region, a special online event hosted by Davenport's German American Heritage Center.
Iconic groups ranging from the Jackson 5 to New Kids on the Block to *NSYNC will be celebrated at The Tangled Wood on April 27 when the Bettendorf venue hosts Boy Band Trivia Night – an evening in which music fans can trade their knowledge for cash prizes while answering questions on the Backstreet Boys, One Direction, Menudo, and loads of other beloved pop artists.
An acclaimed national comedian with ties to the Quad Cities performs two live shows at Davenport's Rhythm City Casino Resort on April 29, with TV and film talent Tammy Pescatelli treating Rhythm Room attendees to the hilarious insights and sharp-witted observations beloved from Last Comic Standing and her 2013 Netflix special Finding the Funny.
Illinois Senate Majority Leader Kimberly Lightford really has her work cut out for her if she wants to forge a compromise on an elected Chicago school board.
Throughout America, state legislatures are engaged in election reform to secure their states' election integrity by codifying policies, including the prohibition of certain toxic practices that prevailed under an umbrella response to COVID-19, but undermined election processes in varying degrees. Ten states are including the elimination of private funding of public elections, as well as other measures regarding voter identification, signature approval, securing gaps in counting ballots, mostly common-sense measures that would return voter confidence to elections.
When Marigold Resources' branding and agribusiness adviser Larry McDonald came up with the idea to re-purpose the portion of the I-74 Bridge that used to house the toll plaza operations into an elevated park on the Mississippi River, his concept rendering (pictured above) was posted to several social-media and LinkedIn accounts.
Since 2006, federal law has capped annual interest-rates on payday loans to active-duty military members at 36 percent. The interest-rate cap was broadened in 2015 to include several more types of personal, unsecured loans. In Illinois, meanwhile, payday loan-borrowers have been subjected to average annual interest-rates of close to 300 percent.
I’ve given Governor JB Pritzker some grief for his failures during the past few months. His graduated income-tax proposal went down in flames in November. He failed to pass his top priorities during January’s lame-duck legislative session. And his candidate for Democratic Party of Illinois chair lost to US Representative Robin Kelly earlier this month.
The late, great author and humorist Nora Ephron famously shared this piece of advice for women: “Above all, be the heroine of your life, not the victim.” That message will also be shared in the Black Box Theatre's new presentation of Nora and her sister Delia Ephron's Love, Loss, & What I Wore, a stage serio-comedy that Variety magazine called “a bittersweet meditation on the joys and tribulations of women's lives” and that the Hollywood Reporter deemed “tender and insightful without being sentimental.”
Based on the wildly popular, Emmy-nominated Disney Channel movie, the stage adaptation Disney's Descendants: The Musical will be performed live by students of Eldridge's North Scott High School, its April 16 through 25 run introducing engaging new characters and reuniting family audiences with favorites from such iconic animated entertainments as Beauty & the Beast, Aladdin, Sleeping Beauty, and Snow White & the Seven Dwarfs.
With its playwright José Rivera lauded by TheatreMania.com for the “expansive, ecstatic, poetic tone in his work that few stage writers dare to attempt,” the riveting quiltwork drama Sonnets for an Old Century will be available for April 16 through 25 viewing in a virtual presentation by Iowa City's Riverside Theatre, treating online audiences to a kaleidoscopic work that inspired Chicago Stage Review to rave, “Rivera’s script is staggering and lovely.”
The lighter side of living-room entrapment – a sensation most of us can identify with – will be explored in three short, hysterical comedies presented by Coralville's City Cirle Theatre Company, with the streaming encore run of Acting Out While Staying In: An Evening of Virtual Comedy, from April 30 through May 2, treating audiences to new works by area playwrights Christopher Okiishi, Paul Story, Janet Schlapkohl, and Brian Tanner.
Area theatre is back, and a beloved series is serving up some good ol’ Midwestern wholesomeness in The Church Basement Ladies in You Smell Barn at the Circa ’21 Dinner Playhouse. This musical comedy was simply the perfect way for the venue to reopen in the wake of last year’s COVID-19 restrictions, and my husband and I had the privilege of attending Friday’s opening-night performance. It was fabulous.
With the artist and his band performing the full repertoire from his most recent album Be Here Instead, alt-country and Americana musician Parker Millsap plays a virtual concert on April 23, the Englert Theatre presentation showcasing a talent who, according to NPR, “explores pop songwriting with playful magnetism,” and who SavingCountryMusic.com deemed “fearless in both what he's willing to say and how he's willing to say it.”
Performing a livestreamed concert set spanning their works from 2011 to 2014, the Grammy-nominated indie-folk artists of The Milk Carton Kids – singer/guitarists Kenneth Pattengale and Joey Ryan – headline a special April 29 presentation hosted by Iowa City's Englert Theatre, with the artists performing songs from their first three recorded collaborations Retrospect, Prologue, and The Ash & Clay.
The rate at which prolific musicians in the Bandcamp era can churn out new material on a short notice will never cease to amaze me. The idea of an “album cycle” in which an artist drops one album a year, or even less frequently, and spends the time between proper releases promoting and performing based around one album’s material still exists in the upper echelons of the music industry.
Well, I, for one, am glad that groups of plucky young musicians get together and decide to make jazz fusion in the year 2021. As an avowed devotee of late-'60s through -'70s fusion as pioneered by the likes of Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock, and Mahavishnu Orchestra, I can’t help but smile when a contemporary band can hit with horn voices, electronics, and funk rhythms all at once. Iowa City’s four-piece band Wave Cage get there.
Rock Island-based black-metal band Everlasting Light has been a favorite Quad Cities project of mine since the release of Heavy Sanctuary back in 2019. A project that revels in the extra layer of obfuscating scuzz that comes from a more informal approach to recording, they still always manage to hit a sweet spot between the high fidelity detail of a “proper” studio take and the more room-tone-soaked final product of a DIY demo tape.
What better way to conclude one of the strangest movie seasons in history – hell, one of the strangest years in history – than with a free-for-all ceremony that will, I venture, see 18 different movies awarded over 23 categories, and the night's only mortal lock a female Chinese-American director winning a category that men, most of them white men, have won 90 times out of 91?
By all means, enjoy the big trademarked ape laying into the big trademarked lizard, or all nine-and-a-half hours of the reconstructed Justice League. Crummy movie or not, I'd rather spend my time watching Thunder Force's Jason Bateman attempt to hold a wine glass with enormous crab claws, or Melissa McCarthy imitate Jodie Foster in Nell a quarter-century past that gag's expiration date.
One of the most acclaimed and adored animated features of the 21st century will enjoy a quartet of special 20th-anniversary screenings between April 25 and 29, with Rave Cinemas Davenport 53rd + IMAX hosting big-screen presentations of Shrek, the Dreamworks Animation mega-hit that will reunite family audiences with the titular green ogre, Donkey, Princess Fiona, Lord Farquaad, and scores of other beloved characters.
While Voyagers' PG-13 rating is already a hint that Neil Burger's futuristic thriller won't emerge as the daring, nasty good time it keeps threatening to be, the problem isn't so much the movie's rating as it is its blandness. Thanks to Alien, we know the deal with screams. But as it turns out, in space, no one can hear you yawn, either.
Now playing at area theaters.
A special in-person event held in conjunction with the current exhibition For America: 200 Years of Painting from the National Academy of Design, the Figge Art Museum's April 23 “After Hours” celebration will treat guests to a socially distanced and semi-private evening at the museum to view the exhibit, wine and individual charcuterie plates from the Figge Cafe, and guides available in the exhibition space to answer questions.
Forgeries, mental illness, intrigue, and rapid fame – the dramatic circumstances of Ralph Albert Blakelock’s life often overshadow the merits of his work. But the Figge Art Museum hopes to amend that in the Davenport venue's new exhibition Blakelock: By the Light of the Moon, a showcase (on display through April 25) of eight exceptional artworks from the museum collection.
A special event highlighting important works in the Figge Art Museum's popular exhibition For America: 200 Years of Painting from the National Academy of Design, the venue's virtual Trio Talk on April 28 will offer unique perspectives by three knowledgeable Figge docents: Cathy Weideman presenting “A Taste of Fauvism: Early 20th Century American Art,” Mary Lou Kotecki with “Taking a Unique Look at Post-War Realism,” and Carol Ehlers' exploration “Modern Art: About Friendship, Diversity of Style, & Commitment to a Cause.”
With spring (almost) in the air, it's time again for the River Cities’ Reader’s annual Spring Photo Contest!
For 2021, we've decided on three new categories for your submissions: “Life,” “Liberty,” and “The Pursuit of Happiness.”
Entrants are welcome to interpret the categories however they wish.
Aquatic paintings, bold tapestries, and woven baskets combine for a fascinating and eclectic trio of exhibitions on display through April 29, with the Quad City Arts International Airport Gallery hosting exhibits by Waterloo, Iowa painter Brian Buckles, Davenport-based textile artist Rowen Schussheim-Anderson, and Moline's woven-basket creator Kelly Hanson.
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