Glancing at the Dick Cooley metal sculpture that he calls "my Sunbeam, Airstream, Toaster Camper," your first thought is likely to be: Look at that - a toaster on roller skates.
But stare at it a bit longer. Hey - there's a bottle opener for the grill. That's a cheese-grater awning. The lights are actually nuts. And wait a minute ... is that what I think it is?
Yup. "I have a martini shaker on the front for a hitch," Cooley said during a recent phone interview. "I always try to put many different things in a piece."
Painter John M. Booth, referencing one of his artworks, says, "Hopefully, it'll put a smile on somebody's wall." The odds are pretty good that it will - in his airbrushed acrylic paintings, there's a lot of smiling going on.
As their character names would suggest, the show's titular trio - Patty (Suz Adamson), LaVonne (Susan Brodin), and Maxine (Judi Gronseth) - performed classics of the 1940s with Andrews Sisters harmonies while engaging in good-natured repartee. An energetic, malapropism-prone emcee named Yannis (Timothy Shawn) danced, flirted, and told corny jokes. A backup band - Bobby Argyle & His Sox - smoothly accompanied the performers to such standards as "In the Mood," "Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree," and "I'll Be Seeing You."
HOLLYWOODLAND
As a percussionist with the world-renowned Alloy Orchestra - described by Roger Ebert as "the best in the world at accompanying silent films" - Ken Winokur reveals that the group doesn't have to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on musical upkeep. A simple trek to the kitchen or garage will suffice.
It's awkwardly paced. It's often indifferently acted. The composition is remedial, the humor is juvenile, and for every scene that soars, another one crashes.
In the wake of Artistic Director Johanne Jakhelln's departure from Ballet Quad Cities after nine seasons, Executive Director Joedy Cook found a replacement in Minneapolis-based Matthew Keefe, who first worked with Cook and Ballet Quad Cities eight years ago. "I just started calling my friends in the dance world," says Cook, "and Matthew was one of the first people I called."
Ted Priester, the new president of Open Cities Cinema - formerly the Open Cities Film Society - knows he has a fight on his hands.
