The Acting Company’s recent production of August Wilson’s Two Trains Running, presented by Hancher Auditorium in collaboration with Riverside and the Englert Theatre and performed on the latter’s stage March 28 and 29, is a solid and heartfelt rendition of one of Wilson’s most meditative plays.
Eastern Iowa
‘I can’t get a passport in this country right now’: Iowa City marks Transgender Day of Visibility in the shadow of anti-trans state, national laws
Approximately 100 people gathered at College Green Park in Iowa City on Tuesday for a rally to mark this year’s International Transgender Day of Visibility (TDOV). “Visibility is power. Visibility is defiance,” Mandi Remington, founder and director of Corridor Community Action Network (CCAN) and a member of the Johnson County Board of Supervisors, told the […]
Review: ‘The Great Gatsby’ is a haunted memory in Mirrorbox Theatre’s ‘These Gilded Souls’
These Gilded Souls, the Great Gatsby adaptation/continuation by playwright Aly Kantor, is currently playing at Mirrorbox Theatre in Cedar Rapids, starring Seth Hoffman as Nick Carraway. Nick has returned to West Egg to scatter the ashes of the wife whom he married and lost in the years following the events of the novel.
Coach Jan Jensen and Kate Martin join the Coralville Community Food Pantry to ‘Team Up Against Hunger’
It’s been a year of changes for the University of Iowa Women’s Basketball Team, with new players taking over from big names like Caitlin Clark and Kate “Money” Martin, both now in the WNBA. The squad also got its first new head coach in a quarter century, as Jan Jensen replaced Lisa Bluder, who retired […]
Bumper Crops: There’s good food, beer and pinball to be found inside this Quad Cities super-venue
Not doing things is pretty much my favorite thing to do, but I recently set aside a Saturday afternoon to hop in a car with a couple buds, Ryan and Doug, and make a pin-grimage to East Moline to check out Midwest Ale Works. By the time we arrived, Ryan and I were in the […]
From basements to grand stages, Mission Creek Festival has nourished Iowa City culture for two decades. This year marks the end of an era.
Mission Creek Festival’s namesake is a ghost river in San Francisco. It once connected the center of the city to Mission Bay, though during the past two centuries it has largely been filled in and redirected through subterranean channels. Over the years, parts of the land that Mission Creek ran through have experienced soil liquefaction, […]
Indigenous art meets comic books, children’s toys and mythology in Cara and Diego Romero’s “Tales of Futures Past” at the Figge
Artists Cara (Chemehuevi) and Diego (Cochiti) Romero’s traveling exhibition Tales of Futures Past premiered this month at the Figge Art Museum in Davenport. Cara and Diego Romero are indigenous artists who work in different mediums exploring the diversity and impact of indigenous identity.
Responding to the moment, Iowa City’s Transgender Day of Visibility expands to seven days of shows, support groups and direct action
This year has seen a sustained assault on the rights of transgender people from the Trump administration and in Iowa, which became the first state ever to erase part of its civil rights act. Republicans in the Legislature pushed through a bill that eliminated protections on the basis of gender identity, which had been added […]
Rozz-Tox’s owner and ‘custodian’ welcomes you to ‘do something fucking cool’ in the Q.C. space
Rock Island, Illinois’ Rozz-Tox is that rare entertainment space that rewards awareness, nurtures community and celebrates revolutionary creativity. Everywhere you look, there’s something interesting to contemplate, literature to read, terrific music and conversation on the air, mixed with the perfume of incredible food. You’re stimulated to explore broader associations between what you’re listening to, what […]
University of Iowa sends email to grad students saying it will ‘no longer guarantee financial support’ for them
The University of Iowa is informing graduate students that it “can no longer guarantee financial support” for them. Grad students in the university’s English Department received an email from their department executive officer (DEO) on Wednesday night informing them of the change. It’s unclear how many other departments have sent out their own emails, but […]
Waterloo schools withdrew 1st graders from a Black History Month book event, citing Trump orders. So locals organized an even bigger version.
Acclaimed authors and readers of all ages are gathering in Waterloo for an event on Saturday, but it’s not a new book festival. It’s “a liberatory act of reading as resistance,” Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author Nikole Hannah-Jones, a co-organizer of Saturday’s read-in, explained on Talk of Iowa last week. “And we’re going to do […]
Review: Angels from the Alvin Ailey dance company brought rhythm, reverence and revelations to the Hancher stage
Movement, in all of its forms, is powerful. The fusion of the physical, political, and spiritual forms came together during the Iowa City stop of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater’s 2025 national tour.

