Returning to downtown Davenport for its incredible 50th year, the Quad-City Times Bix 7 will again find runners and walkers taking on a seven-mile foot race alongside live bands and cheering crowds, the July 27 event famed for being the largest non-marathon race in the Midwest, having captured the imaginations of thousands upon thousands of enthusiasts from both the United States and countries around the globe.

Returning for their third consecutive blast of season-ending silliness in Rock Island's Lincoln Park, the Haus of Ruckus duo of Tee Green and Calvin Vo will lend their signature wit – and that of Guild founder Don Wooten – to a new version of the Aristophanes comedy Plutus, its July 20 through 28 run treating patrons to, as Green says, “an example of satire written in ancient Greece that still holds up in 2024. Which is a bummer.”

Described by DC Metro Theatre Arts as a mystery comedy with “a dizzy, stimulating joy that makes it a whole lot of fun,” the movie and board-game adaptation Clue: On Stage takes residence at Mt. Carroll's Timber Lake Playhouse August 1 through 11, the show a farcical riot that, according to Broadway World, “creates one laugh after another – and a series of 'Ah-hah!'s – as the audience is led on a merry chase.”

It makes perfect sense that Nicolas Cage would be cast as the titular monster in Longlegs, considering that writer/director Osgood Perkins' horror thriller is like the cinematic equivalent of most Cage performances: deliberately gonzo, weirdly earnest, alternately transfixing and repellent, and, in the end, perhaps trying a bit too hard.

The summer-theatre season trundles on with the latest from the Timber Lake Playhouse: The Wizard of Oz. While it features some strong performances, a children’s choir double digits strong, and even an acting dog, certain directing choices made by Chaz Wolcott hinder this timeless classic.

A little-noticed bill passed both the Illinois House and Senate that will generate $300 to $400 million a year for local governments, including $95-127 million for the Regional Transportation Authority. The bill (SB3362) will help capture sales tax revenue from more out of state retailers and in-state retailers who ship to Illinoisans in out-of-state locations.

Dear Quad Cities Theatergoer,

It may seem strange that I should be writing this letter, the explanation being that 84 Charing Cross Road, now playing at the Richmond Hill Barn Theatre, is a play that is almost exclusively epistolatory in nature: The story is told through the recitation of letters. The opening-night performance was a charming evening, and in telling you about it, I could think of no better method than through that of a letter.

Adapted from the delightful series of children's picture books written and illustrated by sisters Victoria and Elizabeth Kann, the bubbly, bighearted Pinkalicious: The Musical enjoys a July 23 through August 10 run of morning and afternoon performances at Rock Island's Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse, the tasty stage treat lauded by Centerstage as "a cotton-candy-Technicolored dream come true."

A Steven Spielberg movie smash becomes a lavish, tuneful, funny, and romantic City Circle Theatre Company presentation in Catch Me If You Can, the Tony Award-winning Broadway hit that runs July 19 through 28 at the Coralville Center for the Performing Arts, and a show that Variety magazine praised for its “swinging orchestrations” and “considerable entertainment value.”