Sometimes I will read a great book, or see a great play, and wait in excited expectation for the author’s next work. That was my feeling when I attended the District Theatre’s May 13 production of A Behanding in Spokane.

Anthony Natarelli, Liv Lyman, Erin Platt, Sara Wegener, Nancy Teerlinck, Jason Platt, Jennifer Sondgeroth, David Miller, and Christopher Tracy in The Addams FamilyTaking The Addams Family as a sign, I'm excited about the District Theatre's future in downtown Rock Island's former Argus building, and while there are still a few growing pains to overcome, the company is clearly off to a good start.

Autumn Loose, Liv Lyman, Lauren VanSpeybroeck, and Becca Meumann Johnson in Legally Blonde: The MusicalLegally Blonde: The Musical is, of course, based on the 2001 hit starring Reese Witherspoon, a movie that led to a rather woebegone sequel in 2003's Legally Blonde: Red, White, & Blonde. Yet while watching the original film's stage version on Thursday, I felt that Red, White, & Blonde also would've been a fitting title for Quad City Music Guild's terrifically peppy new presentation, considering that this solo-star-driven show came off, instead, as pretty wonderfully democratic.