We’re in a pandemic, in case you haven’t noticed. And in a pandemic, especially as the parent of a toddler, time (to put a fine point on it) gets a bit — slippery. So on this past rather innocuous Tuesday night, when Ghost Creek premiered, I accessed the website at “about 7” rather than at […]
online events
Sparse and exquisite, Riverside’s production of ‘A Christmas Carol’ is exactly what we need

With its opening this past weekend, Riverside Theatre’s production of Paul Morella’s A Christmas Carol adaptation has officially brought the holiday season down upon us. The pandemic takes the loss this time — it can’t rid us of the magic, charm and lessons we cherish from stingy old Ebenezer Scrooge. Nestle in front of your […]
Mirrorbox Theatre reflects on Out the Box, its thriving 2020 virtual series, closing with ‘landscape’

When everything seems to be going wrong in a world shifted askew by the weight of our own tears, that’s precisely when we turn to faraway lands to bring us hope: the arts. Of course, it’s 2020, a time when the arts we consume have been strictly confined within a small rectangular screen. But sometimes […]
How to grieve in America: Iowa City photographer Rachel Cox turns her focus to our shared spaces of grief

It’s a simple, but profound question: Why do we grieve in the way that we do? Photographer Rachel Cox has been contemplating our process of grief for a few years now as she’s worked composing a series of photographs focused on our shared physical spaces of grieving. This series, Mors Scena, comprises her Iowa Artists […]
Brave old world: ‘Coded Bias’ explores the dangers of AI tech and how prejudice defines the future

“The more that humans share with me, the more I learn.” This is the somewhat ominous voiceover, sourced from the Microsoft AI robot Tay, that opens Shalini Kantayya’s equally ominous documentary, Coded Bias. This line is ostensibly supposed to reassure us that robots rely on human inputs in order to function and only through increased […]
Masterful storytelling explores the core of communication in Riverside’s ‘Midnight Your Time’

As both a mother and a daughter, I found Midnight Your Time resonant and meaningful. Riverside Theatre’s current streaming production, Midnight Your Time by Adam Brace, is a one-woman show featuring Riverside co-founder Jody Hovland. Directed by Adam Knight, this is the story of a mother learning a new role as her adult children have […]
Quirky, tender ‘The Mole Agent’ marks virtual return of Vino Vérité series

Today, Oct. 23, marks the FilmScene debut of The Mole Agent, a film that serves as the first ever Virtual Vino Vérité (“online wine and cinematic realism,” essentially, for all those who just mind-mumbled right over that). Co-sponsored by Bread Garden Market and Little Village, Vino Vérité traditionally involves a catered reception with a filmmaker […]
Joy Vandervort-Cobb animates a whole ensemble of characters in Riverside Theatre and PURE Theatre’s ‘No Child …’

Over the past seven months, theater companies in eastern Iowa and elsewhere have reinvented themselves, branching out from traditional spaces onto streaming platforms to keep performance and themselves alive. Starting Thursday, Riverside Theatre — in conjunction with PURE Theatre in Charleston, South Carolina — offered another to their audiences: a recorded play that audiences can […]
Form follows function: Creating new theater works in COVID-times

The theater community in eastern Iowa is antsy. In the five months since the COVID-19 pandemic shuttered stages across the country, theater artists here — a region that boasts multiple professional theaters, countless community theaters and new eager startups laying claim to their own vibe at a rate of at least one or two a […]
‘The Winter’s Tale’: Zooming into a summer tradition with a twist

Fans of Riverside Theatre’s annual Free Summer Shakespeare productions can look forward to a ray of light in the dark of this year’s tumult. Like most theaters, Riverside has temporarily shuttered in person performances in the interest of public safety. This necessary decision prevents us from gathering in Lower City Park’s Festival Stage this summer […]
Five questions with: Photographer Barry Phipps

Iowa City multimedia artist Barry Phipps has released his most recent book of photographs, Driving a Table Down (University of Iowa Press). It’s a visual travelogue told over 18 days and 108 pages, detailing a trip taken with his mother from Iowa to Florida, to visit (and deliver the titular furniture to) family. In Zak […]
Theatre Cedar Rapids Underground goes online: 10th annual festival pivots amid ongoing COVID concerns

Theatre Cedar Rapids is underground and online this year as they prepare to present their 10th-annual Underground New Play Festival. This year’s theme, The Mysterious, offers theatergoers an opportunity to see 13 original plays written, directed and performed by people with Iowa connections. The plays will be presented May 16 and 17 in an online […]