Live theatre returns to Arkansas this month and, while there’s not a full contingent of performances in the offing, it is a start. Here’s how a few of the city’s theatre companies are tackling a virus that’s turned their worlds upside down.
Werner Trieschmann
Posted inEntertainment
Invisible, In Plain Sight: The art and music of Michael Jukes
Jukes has been a creative dynamo since he escaped from the clutches of North Little Rock’s Northeast High School in the early 1970s, and he’s been making compelling music and comics ever since, all without achieving what famous Arkansas recluse Charles Portis called “escape velocity” from Arkansas. That is not to say Jukes didn’t try.
Posted inEntertainment
Jo McDougall on Arkansas Youth Poetry Day, working during the wee hours and why eliminating arts in school is ‘courting shallow thinking’
Ahead of Arkansas Youth Poetry Day, we talked with state poet laureate Jo McDougall about her work and about her drive to foster new young poets.
Posted inArkansas Blog
Preaching in a Pandemic: A Q&A with Pulaski Heights UMC’s John Robbins
We talked with John Robbins, senior pastor at Pulaski Heights United Methodist Church, about what it means to be a spiritual leader during the time of COVID-19.
Posted inEntertainment
UAMS’ Dr. Cam Patterson plays guitar, and his band’s new album is fully of the moment
It doesn’t seem possible cultural products produced in 2020 are going to be able to pass by without reference to the pandemic.
Posted inRock Candy
UAMS leader Patterson has music bona fides
Somewhere in this stuffed-to-the-gills life, UAMS Chancellor Cam Patterson’s not-so-secret identity as a hardcore music fanatic and music maker has emerged with clues dropped along the way, including the photo of Big Star’s “#1 Record” on his Twitter profile. He answers all our music-related questions.
Posted inEntertainment
At the helm of Arkansas Arts Center Children’s Theatre: A Q&A with Katie Campbell
“I believe that children are deserving of artistic experiences that speak to them,,” Campbell told us, “not because they will be future adults, but because of who and what they are right now as young people.”
Posted inAE Feature
‘Disfarmer’: behind the camera
The strange case of Arkansas photographer Disfarmer, subject of a new play opening this weekend.
Posted inRock Candy
Live Review: Eric Church and Dwight Yoakam at Verizon
Apparently Dwight Yoakam’s acting career is sufficiently slack enough that Friday night saw him opening for bro-country kingpin Eric Church at Verizon Arena. Hollywood is taking Yoakam in small enough doses (he has a recurring part on CBS’s “Under the Dome”) that he can lend his considerable talents to country music, which currently can use any kind of flavor it can get.
Posted inTheater Reviews
Musical ‘Shrek’ succeeds, mostly
If light family entertainment is your speed.