Director Michael Brindish’s production is the perfect introduction to this venue; even the Rock Island theatre's seasoned patrons are in for a treat. While this Mamma Mia! felt familiar – here I go again – there were a few tricks up its sleeve, making it, for me, a unique experience.

America is experiencing a non-organic, deliberate, and highly orchestrated socioeconomic destabilization whether we admit or not. The underlying agenda is to replace America's governance model as a Constitutional Republic to a global Progressive version of Neo-Feudalism, mirroring all its worst aspects and those of Marxism, Fascism, Socialism, Communism, and Monarchism. Every one of the above is a top-down model of governance with precious few haves and super-majorities of have-nots who answer to a centralized authority that owns and/or controls all resources and means of production in a society.

We're very pleased to publish Douglas Tallamay's original essay for the Reader on the importance of oak trees. For an even deeper dive we highly recommend his 2021 book The Nature of Oaks. It's full of richly produced color photos and its presentation is a work of art unto itself. Here's an excerpt from the book, regarding how and why the oak tree is the “keystone species.”

The resulting deformation of the emerging leaves is heartbreaking. Over the last 20 years, we have called several times, and asked for an inspector to come and collect damaged leaf samples for the analysis by IDALS, the Iowa department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship. The results come back with a cocktail of noxious chemicals, and always include Acetochlor, Atrazine, and, in recent years, Dicamba and 2,4-D.

A trio of gifted Midwestern artists are currently showcasing dozens of glorious works in a variety of mediums at the Quad City Arts Center, with the Rock Island venue's exhibition Raabe, Rial, & Xiao, through June 23, boasting recent sculptures by Lisa Raabe, fused-glass works by Michelle Rial, and paintings by Peter Xiao.

Presented as the latest in a series of groundbreaking feature-length films that celebrate the remarkable achievements women have made in the cinematic arts, director Ava DuVernay's Academy Award-winning Selma enjoys a May 25 screening at Davenport's Figge Art Museum, this 2014 historical drama a work that the New York Times deemed "a triumph of efficient, emphatic cinematic storytelling."

If you're a parent of young children, you're no doubt familiar with the magical world of the TV puppy Bluey, and on May 20, the Davenport Public Library's Fairmount Street Branch will celebrate the pooch and his pals in the Bluey Party!, with games, crafts, snacks, book recommendations, and a "flossing dance party" taking place in advance of the forthcoming Bluey's Big Play touring event at Davenport;s Adler Theatre.

Double-platinum-selling musicians whose smash hits from the '90s include As Ugly as They Wanna Be and America's Least Wanted, the hard rockers of Ugly Kid Joe headline a May 22 concert event at East Moline venue The Rust Belt, their 2022 album Rad Wings of Destiny inspiring Tom Cornell of CGCM Rock Radio to rave, "Showing perhaps more subtlety than all those years ago, but still maintaining the fun and silliness in small doses, they still know how to rock and entertain."