author Dana-Moss Peterson (left), with Jessica Denney, in New Ground Theatre's Mr. MarmaladeOver the years, Davenport's New Ground Theatre has prided itself on the presentation of new works by emerging authors. But this year, even Artistic Director Chris Jansen is shocked to find the company not only producing eight new works in a season, but eight new works - the majority of them by local authors - over a two-night span.

Jane Levy in Evil DeadEVIL DEAD

While I like the movie just fine, I'm not enough of a fanatic for Sam Raimi's 1981 splatter classic The Evil Dead to get in a twist about the existence of director Fede Alvarez's new, definite-article-free remake Evil Dead. (It's when Hollywood inevitably remakes Raimi's priceless horror sequel Evil Dead II that we're gonna have problems.) But despite being mostly entertained by Alvarez's beyond-bloody outing, especially during its second half, I do have to question the decision to make it, for so much of its length, so bloody serious. This is a film, after all, in which a demon is released by a supernatural incantation, nail guns and electric carving knives are the weapons of choice, and one character escapes a (more-)dreadful fate by enacting a speedier version of 127 Hours. How are we not asked to laugh at all this?

Wayne Music

Wayne "The Train" Hancock

Rock Island Brewing Company

Saturday, April 6, 9:30 p.m.

 

Acclaimed country musician Wayne "The Train" Hancock plays a Rock Island Brewing Company concert on April 6, and you'll need to be at least 21 to attend. However, all ages are welcome to learn about the artist's gifts right here! AllMusic.com, for instance, calls Hancock "arguably the finest country traditionalist working the 21st Century country scene." And Scram Magazine, which describes Hancock's 2003 CD Swing Time as "a great goddam live album," raves that Hancock "imbues his material with the kind of I-don't-give-a-f--k edge that pushes each and every one of these 'old-fashioned songs' right up into your face."

Hmm. Given the language, maybe you should be at least 21 to read this article, too.

Dwayne Johnson in G.I. Joe: RetaliationG.I. JOE: RETALIATION

If you handed a box of crayons to a group of eight-year-olds with action figures, they'd probably come up with a more entertaining storyline for G.I. Joe: Retaliation than the one we're stuck with, which is your standard blockbuster nonsense about a megalomaniac's plan for world dominion and the crack team of well-armed, quip-ready hotshots attempting to thwart him. In a welcome surprise, though, director Jon M. Chu's follow-up to 2009's G.I. Joe: Rise of the Cobra is, unlike its forebear, quite a bit of zippy, throwaway fun, a fast-moving and happily unpretentious diversion with jokes, and good ones, obviously written specifically for viewers well over the age of eight.

Selena Gomez, Rachel Korine, Vanessa Hudgens, and Ashley Benson in Spring BreakersSPRING BREAKERS

At the screening of Spring Breakers that I attended, I counted eight viewers who walked out of the movie, and stayed out, well before the end credits rolled. In all honesty, I'm amazed the tally wasn't higher than that. The movie being touted in print and in trailers promises a rowdy, randy romp in the sun with built-in audience-grabbers: Disney princesses acting nasty! James Franco with cornrows and grillz! But the movie that writer/director Harmony Korine has actually made - despite, indeed, its also being a rowdy, randy romp in the sun - bears so little relation to its cheeky, borderline-innocuous advertising campaign that patrons can be easily forgiven for feeling badly misled and deciding to bolt. It would be like going to see Dumbo and instead getting Gus Van Sant's Elephant.

AntigoneTheatre

Antigone

QC Theatre Workshop

Friday, March 22, through Saturday, March 30

 

It seems to have taken forever to get here, but guess what, folks? Spring officially starts this week! The sun is shining! Birds are singing! And over at the QC Theatre Workshop, the season's arrival is being celebrated by our area's classical-theatre troupe the Prenzie Players with angry gods, family dishonor, rebellion, treachery, imprisonment, suicide ... !

Wow, Prenzies. Like a nice production of Barefoot in the Park would've killed ya?

Steve Carell, Steve Buscemi, and Jim Carrey in The Incredible Burt WonderstoneTHE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE

A mere week after the release of Oz the Great & Powerful, the garish, boring box-office smash that's neither great nor powerful, Misnomer March continues with The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, a comedy about warring Las Vegas magicians that's awkwardly cast, overly sentimental, and decidedly not incredible. Yet considering how roundly disappointing the 2013 film year has been thus far, you can still have a fair amount of fun at director Don Scardino's outing, despite this slapstick with heart being scattershot at best, and despite the movie almost appearing apologetic about its most unexpected and mordantly funny bits.

James Franco in Oz the Great & PowerfulOZ THE GREAT & POWERFUL

As numerous effect-heavy entertainments have proved over the years, few film actors, and even fewer good ones, look altogether comfortable performing in wholly pixelated landscapes opposite wholly digitized characters. Yet I'm not sure I've seen any star look less connected with his artificial environment than James Franco does in Oz the Great & Powerful, director Sam Raimi's mega-budgeted and intensely disappointing prequel to The Wizard of Oz.

Sara WatkinsMusic

Sara Watkins

The Redstone Room

Friday, March 15, 8:30 p.m.

 

On March 15, the Redstone Room will host an evening with a musician who received a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album, toured with the likes of Lyle Lovett and Dolly Parton, served as guest host for Garrison Keillor's A Prairie Home Companion, and has been a nationally renowned vocalist and fiddle player for more than 22 years.

I will attempt not to seethe with resentment at the fact that the musician in question is only 31 years old.

Rock of Ages at the Adler TheatreWelcome to the Reader's annual article on springtime area-theatre productions, where our trek through the season's comedies, dramas, and musicals will have us taking a walk in the woods with Antigone, wandering into suburbia with Eurydice, and realizing that something's afoot in our town when Talley's folly makes Cinderella go boom on Avenue Q.

Okay, so that takes care of 10 upcoming titles ... only 50 or so to go ... .

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