Who needs Bridgerton when you have fantastic live theater just around the corner? Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, (Dave Malloy, 2012) is a high-energy musical based loosely on an excerpt from Leo Tolstoy’s epic novel War and […]
Not five minutes into The Niceties by Eleanor Burgess, running in the lush new home of Riverside Theatre, I laugh-snort at something Crystal Marie Stewart says — something I’ll continue to do all night. It is then that I write […]
The quote “Art disturbs the comfortable and comforts the disturbed” has been attributed to various people in a variety of situations, but it is nowhere more applicable than to Cycle Play, currently running in the downstairs Grandon Theatre space at […]
After waiting nearly two years to open, Theatre Cedar Rapids began its run of Kinky Boots (score by Cyndi Lauper, book by Harvey Fierstein) to a house of appreciative audience members, some of whom had held on to their tickets […]
Eden Prairie, 1971 is not only Riverside Theatre’s first show in their newly renovated space on the Ped Mall, but — as a part of the National New Play Network’s Rolling World Premiere — Riverside is the first theater to […]
Accents, set design and murder, oh my! I spent a cozy evening at the Des Moines Playhouse with my partner and a glass of Cabernet Sauvignon enjoying the absolute delight of Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express. On opening […]
This past Friday, Theatre Cedar Rapids reopened its main stage for the first time since COVID-19 hit with Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella. Director Angie Toomsen brings the adapted stage play to life through the brilliant actors throughout every scene. The […]
Saturday was a beautiful almost-autumn evening at the Peggy Boyle Whitworth Amphitheatre. Around me on the grassy hill at Brucemore was a full house (if there can be such a thing at an outdoor performance space) of families on picnic […]
Angie Toomsen, director of Riverside Theatre’s production of The Comedy of Errors, brilliantly brought together two things that theater historians might compare to orange juice and toothpaste: 1970s country and Shakespeare. Southern drawls mixed with Shakespearean monologues made the show […]
Willow Creek Theatre Company kicked off its opening season in January 2020, and after just one production, Matt & Ben, they were forced to close their doors [insert groan]. But [title of show] marks a new beginning for WCTC, and […]
As my tablemates and I arrived at Theatre Cedar Rapids’ production of Little Women at Brucemore, I could feel a crispness in the air. The rainy sky had opened to let the sun out just as we rolled up into […]
The last time we spoke, Riverside Theatre producing artistic director Adam Knight impressed upon me his desire to re-imagine the face of professional theater in Iowa. For years, Riverside has been producing intimate, small cast shows with many of the […]
