Movie lovers with a firm grasp of recent(-ish) film history can show off their smarts when Bettendorf venue The Tangled Wood hosts 2000s Movies Trivia Night, a May 18 event in which area cinephiles are invited to trade their knowledge for cash prizes while answering questions on cinematic works in the decade of Erin Brockovich, There Will Be Blood, The Dark Knight, and Up.
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.
The life and accomplishments of Quad Cities namesake will be showcased in Bettendorf Public Library's latest virtual presentation in its popular “Community Connections” series, with local historian Gena Schantz, in the May 20 program George Davenport & the Founding of the Quad Cities, tracing Davenport's many careers and examining how he adapted his talents to serve and foster the development of the communities that surrounded him.
Delivered as part of the Davenport Public Library's virtual 3rd Thursday at Hoover's Presidential Library & Museum programming, the May 20 Zoom webinar Iowa's Communal Utopias will find Peter Hoehnle delivering a sweeping overview of different attempts by Iowans to create their own form of utopia featuring the Iowa Pioneer Phalanx, Salburia, the Icarian Communities, the Clydesdale Colony, Communia, and, principally, the Amana Colonies
Hosting an original exhibition displayed in conjunction with the Figge Art Museum's For America: 200 Years of Painting from the National Academy of Design, Davenport's Putnam Museum & Science Center will, through June 30, offer a fascinating exploration into historic portraiture with the homegrown exhibit Faces of the Past.
The state legislators negotiating the new, massive energy-reform bill were said to have made real progress at their Tuesday working group-meeting last week.
The inspector general’s report on the deadly COVID-19 outbreak at the Illinois Department of Veterans’ Affairs LaSalle Veterans’ Home is a maddening story of incompetence and chaos at every level.
The state’s fiscal news of late has been a whole lot better than just about anyone expected. March’s base general-funds revenue grew by $422 million versus a year ago, mainly because of stronger-than-expected receipts of personal and corporate income taxes and sales taxes. That follows a growth of $330 million in February’s receipts. The revenue surge has been so rosy that some have openly wondered whether Governor JB Pritzker was telling the truth last year when he warned voters that failing to approve a graduated-income tax, which would’ve eventually produced $3+ billion a year in new revenues, would result in budget-cuts or higher taxes.
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.
Described by Broadway World as “a musical so jam-packed with hits that it's almost overwhelming,” the toe-tapping, soul-lifting revue Beehive: The '60s Musical enjoys a late-spring/early-summer run at Rock Island's Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse, this infectiously entertaining salute to female pop, rock, and soul singers lauded by DC Metro Theater Arts as “a big-hearted, well-accomplished, utterly tuneful joy.”
Some of the most memorable and beloved tunes from the worlds of theatre and movies will receive delightful virtual interpretations from May 21 through May 23, with the Coralville Center for the Performing Arts presenting the original musical revue The Show Must Go Online, a student-performed collection of hits from students of the venue's theatre program Young Footliters.
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.
Reviews by Jeff Ashcraft, Patricia Baugh-Riechers, Audra Beals, Pamela Briggs, Dee Canfield, Kim Eastland, Emily Heninger, Heather Herkelman, Paula Jolly, Victoria Navarro, Mark Ruebling, Mike Schulz, Joy Thompson, Oz Torres, Brent Tubbs, Jill (Pearson) Walsh, and Thom White.
Performing a livestreamed concert set spanning their works from 2015 to 2019, the Grammy-nominated indie-folk artists of The Milk Carton Kids – singer/guitarists Kenneth Pattengale and Joey Ryan – headline a special May 13 presentation hosted by Iowa City's Englert Theatre, with the artists performing songs from their most recent recorded collaborations Monterey, All the Things That I Did & All the Things That I Didn't Do, and The Only Ones.
One of the most acclaimed and electrifying stars of stage and screen will be showcased in a special, live Quad City Symphony Orchestra event on May 15, with Davenport's LeClaire Park serving as the locale for An Evening with Renée Elise Goldsberry, a night of unforgettable Broadway, pop, and soul favorites with the Tony and Grammy Award winning sensation from Lin-Manuel Miranda's Hamilton.
A special virtual event wrapping up the University of Dubuque's “Live at Heritage Center” programming for the 2020-21 season, the May 15 concert with the esteemed members of the Columbus Symphony Orchestra and world-renowned guest organist Alan Morrison will follow a dedication ceremony for the university's new custom-crafted pipe organ, a glorious instrument with more than 3,000 pipes gifted by John and Alice Butler.
Returning to Davenport's Redstone Room for the first time in more than a year, Polyrhythms' popular Third Sunday Jazz Series gets an exhilarating reboot with its May 16 concert by Silversmith, a new six-piece, hard-bop jazz band that plays originals and jazz classics by artists including Horace Silver, Jimmy Smith, Dexter Gordon, Kenny Dorham, Charles Mingus, and Lee Morgan.
Once again, thanks to Bandcamp’s region-based search, I've happened upon an inexplicable pocket of highly technical metal nestled somewhere along the riverbanks of the Mississippi, this time courtesy of Davenport-based shredder Austin Korth. If the material he has here is any indicator, his self-proclaimed quest to "play and record as much music as possible" (as per his Bandcamp bio) shows plenty of promise for idiosyncratic Quad Cities home recording.
While there are certainly more noxious performance traits than an obvious, incessant need to be loved, Billy Crystal expends so much energy strong-arming us for adoration and sympathy in this sentimental dramedy that I occasionally found it hard to even look at him. At least Tiffany Haddish is on hand to occasionally make the guy look good – and by “good,” I really mean “less insufferable.”
Hailed by the New York Times as an “engrossing” entertainment with “evocative Southern charm,” the Oscar-nominated dramatic comedy Fried Green Tomatoes enjoys a quartet of 30th-anniversary screenings as the fifth presentation in Fathom Events' seventh-annual TCM Big Screen Classics series, its May 9 through 13 run at Rave Cinemas Davenport 53rd 18 + IMAX treating audiences to a beloved favorite that Rotten Tomatoes describes as “powerfully effective.”
It turns out that the preview goosing us with the promise of Incredibles-esque fun isn't at all necessary, because TMvtM proves so clever, so exciting, and so consistently riotous that it already feels like a computer-animated comedy classic. It's literally been years since I've laughed so hard at a movie, and I didn't even need a crowd of equally delighted cineplex patrons to keep me roaring – though I sure wouldn't have minded one.
Featuring highlights from the exhibition’s display and museum staffers and community members sharing their favorite program memories, the Figge Art Museum's For America: 200 Years of Painting from the National Academy of Design – which opened on February 20 – will be celebrated in a virtual May 13 event paying tribute to the traveling exhibit's hugely popular, three-month area engagement.
Many thanks to all who entered the River Cities' Reader’s Spring 2021 Photo Contest for which we received entries in the categories of "Life," "Liberty," and "The Pursuit of Happiness." Here are our winners and favorites. Thanks to all who submitted!
Praised by the New York Times for his “unblinking alertness” and delivering “a new kind of oddity and a renewed sense of provocation about painting,” a lauded artist will be the subject of the virtual May 16 presentation In Conversation: Jeremiah William McCarthy and Walter Hatke, in which McCarthy – the National Academy of Design's curator and co-curator of For America: 200 Years of Painting from the National Academy of Design – speaks with Hatke about how his practice resonates with the work of the artists featured in the exhibition.
With the Figge Art Museum serving as one of only eight stops on the exhibit's national tour, the eagerly anticipated For America: 200 Years of Painting from the National Academy of Design will enjoy a home at the Davenport venue through May 16, showcasing more than 90 works made between 1810 and 2010 by some of the greatest American artists, drawn from the collections of the National Academy of Design in New York.
Always an eagerly awaited series at the Figge Art Museum, the latest incarnation of Young Artists at the Figge will be on display through May 16, with the Davenport venue again celebrating the accomplishments of budding creative talents of local elementary art students whose works will be showcased in six individual exhibits and their accompanying Recognition Days.
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