22 Mar 2021

Roles in the Hay: “The Church Basement Ladies in You Smell Barn,” at the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse through May 15

By Rochelle Arnold

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.

15 Mar 2021

Detective Friction: “Dick Tracy: A Live Radio Play,” at the Black Box Box Theatre through March 20

By Madeline Dudziak

Once again, and hopefully for good, theatre is back in the Quad Cities, and the Black Box Theatre is dipping its toe into the world of live performances with Dick Tracy: A Live Radio Play. Director Lora Adams started Saturday's performance by describing it as a helping of Chinese Food Theatre: We would be full when we left, but hungry for more theatre soon. While this metaphor made me chuckle, I soon realized just how true it was. This charming foray back into theatre definitely left me eager for more.

26 Oct 2020

The Waiting Is the Hardest Part: “Waiting for Godot,” at the Black Box Theatre through October 31

By Madeline Dudziak

The plot for Waiting for Godot, currently running at Moline’s Black Box Theatre, is rather simple: Two men wait near a tree for the infamous Godot. It’s unclear how many days they’ve already been waiting, or how much longer the wait will take. How the men pass time makes up the meat of this story, and Samuel Beckett’s absurdist classic ultimately grapples with the age-old question: What does it all mean?

28 Sep 2020

Funeral Procession: “Three Viewings,” at the Black Box Theatre through October 3

By Pamela Briggs

Family. Love. Money. Major occupiers of our time; continual goals and sources of both stress and joy. We want them and work for them, or in spite of them. They facilitate our dreams, or get in their way. We race toward our desires until Death, who always wins, tells us we're done.

14 Sep 2020

We Eat, They Drink, Everyone's Merry: "The Savannah Sipping Society," at the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse through November 7

By Rochelle Arnold

It’s been a painfully long wait, but I finally got to crack open my new notebook and fresh pen for Wednesday night's performance of The Savannah Sipping Society at the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse.

24 Aug 2020

Stalking, On-Air: “The 39 Steps: A Live Radio Play” at the Black Box Theatre through August 30

By Madeline Dudziak

If you’re hoping to see some live theatre to forget COVID-19 and the pandemic we’re in, then the Black Box Theatre’s latest, The 39 Steps: A Live Radio Play, is not for you – because director Lora Adams and her fantastic cast have embraced the challenges of producing theatre in 2020 in a way that manages to pay respect to this invisible virus while still keeping the show lighthearted and charming.

17 Jul 2020

Governess Ball: “The Turn of the Screw,” at the Black Box Theatre through July 19

By Pamela Briggs

English people have a deserved reputation for rigid politeness, avoiding embarrassment, and keeping improprieties secret. These personality traits help drive much of the comedy of English farces. They drive this English story in an entirely different direction. Inside the proper tea kettle of this crowd, there's a bubbling mass of depravity and perversion threatening to boil, shriek, and spew forth secrets. Here, the unspeakable is spoken – for the most part … eventually … – with plenty of mystery yet to wonder over.

09 Mar 2020

We, Ourselves, and Us: “Their Town,” at the Playcrafters Barn Theatre through March 15

By Pamela Briggs

The Playcrafters Barn Theatre's Their Town is this season's first production in the venue's Barn Owl series of newer (or debuting) plays, and this year, all four “Barn Owls” are by local authors. Playwright Alexander Richardson has not only kicked off the 2020 series with a strong script, but has also, along with his and director Elizabeth Melville's cast and crew, given the upcoming presentations much to live up to.

17 Feb 2020

Crazy Little Thing Called Love: “The Wedding Singer,” at the Spotlight Theatre through February 23

By Madeline Dudziak

If you missed the perfectly timed Valentine’s Day opening of the Spotlight Theatre’s The Wedding Singer, don’t have a cow. There’s a second weekend of this righteous romantic-comedy musical if you’re in need of an extra opportunity to show your sweethearts how much you love them. The energetic cast, familiar storyline, and totally awesome music make for the perfect escape from reality back to the '80s for a few hours.

10 Feb 2020

On and Off the Rails: “The Boxcar Children,” at the Playcrafters Barn Theatre through February 16

By Rochelle Arnold

The Playcrafters Barn Theatre's presentation of The Boxcar Children opened on Friday with a simple, wholesome journey of four Depression-era youngsters and their adventures as recent orphans. Knowing that they will likely go to different foster homes, the Alden children escape into the woods and find a boxcar in which they begin to live, and while the set design was sparse, the actors, for the most part, were excellent – I found myself carefully listening to each character as they expressed their innermost thoughts and feelings. Like the old saying goes, "Less is more," and in this show, I found that to be particularly true.

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