Monthly Archives: March 2019

The Ides of March

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Today is the Ides of March Since that date is a crucial component of one of Shakespeare’s most-famous plays, it seems a good chance to preview the 2019 Arkansas Shakespeare Theatre season.

The lineup includes: The Comedy of Errors (the first Shakespeare play I ever read), The Scottish Play (sorry, but I don’t want to invoke the curse so I won’t write or say the title), as well as a streamlined version of Romeo and Juliet for families.  Also on tap, in the non-Shakespeare musical slot is Guys and Dolls.

Here is more about each show.
The Comedy of Errors
A tragic shipwreck, two sets of twins divided at birth, mistaken identities, and unrequited love provide the perfect recipe for fun in this Shakespearean farce. The fates bring the brothers and their long-lost father Aegeon together in the land of Ephesus with hilarious results.
Outside on the lawn at UCA

Guys and Dolls
A Musical Fable of Broadway
Based on a Story and Characters of Damon Runyon
Music and Lyrics by Frank Loesser
Book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows
High-rolling gambler Sky Masterson never took a bet he couldn’t win, until he met the no-nonsense Sarah Brown, a mission worker set on redeeming the sinners of Broadway. While fellow gambler Nathan Detroit has his own hands full with his fourteen year engagement to Miss Adelaide. It’s the audience who wins in this delightful musical of love and luck!
On-stage in Reynolds Performance Hall

[The Scottish Play]
Brave warrior The Thane of Cawdor emerges victorious from battle to be greeted by three witches who hail him as the future king of Scotland. What follows is a dizzying descent into political machinations, murder, and madness.
On-stage in Reynolds Performance Hall

Family Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet
The fighting families of Montague and Capulet put their feud before their children’s happiness in Shakespeare’s classic tale of “star-crossed” young love, reimagined for audiences of all ages in this one-hour adaptation.
On-stage in Reynolds Performance Hall.  Also available to tour!

Performance dates will be announced in coming weeks.

Mary Ruth Marotte is the Executive Director and Rebekah Scallet is the Producing Artistic Director.

Celebrate National Quilting Day on March 16 at Historic Arkansas Museum

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On Saturday, March 16, Celebrate National Quilting Day at the museum with the Arkansas Quilters Guild. There will be several quilters demonstrating basic quilting techniques and working together to create a twin size quilt to donate to Dorcas House Women & Children’s Shelter. This will run from 10am to 4pm.

Quilts in the Museum Store
The museum just got in several new wall quilts by Arkansas fiber artist Barbara Carlson. Carlson’s bright and whimsical wall quilts have been featured in museums and shows across the country. Her quilting work is non-traditional, utilizing hand-painted fabrics, beads, feathers, upholstery fabrics and other materials in her pieces. Come take a look — and maybe take one home!

Women Making History – Hattie Caraway

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CARAWAY, Hattie WyattHattie Wyatt Caraway served for 14 years in the U.S. Senate. She was the first woman to be elected to a seat in the United States Senate.

Born in Tennessee in 1878, she entered Dickson Normal College at age 14. For several years, she and her fiancé Thaddeus Caraway taught school.  The couple married in 1902.

A fiery orator, Thaddeus, became politically active in Arkansas. He served as a prosecuting attorney before serving four terms in Congress. In 1920, he ran for, and was elected to the US Senate. In 1931, Thaddeus Caraway died. Arkansas Governor Harvey Parnell appointed Hattie Caraway to fill out the remainder of her husband’s term.

She had been a trusted adviser to her husband and worked hart behind the scenes in his campaigns. While she later downplayed her political involvement (apparently to appear as a “poor, little widow”), she had been active in her campaigns and during his service in Washington.

After the appointment, Governor Parnell also endorsed her for the special election to fill out the remainder of the term (which expired in fourteen months).  By winning that over two independent candidates, Hattie Caraway made history as the first woman to be elected to the U S Senate.

Few, if any, in the Democratic establishment expected Hattie to run in the 1932 election for a full Senate term. Most of the state’s political heavyhitters had an eye on the seat.  To their surprise, on the last day to file for the Democratic primary, she threw her hat in the ring against six men.  Without the backing of the Arkansas Democratic political structure, she called upon her friend from neighboring Louisiana, Senator Huey P. Long.  Not only was he glad to help an ally, his chief rival in the Senate was Arkansas’ other senator, Joe T. Robinson.  Long positioned her as a champion for the downtrodden. This seemed to work, she received 44.7percent of the vote and carried 61 of 75 counties.

Caraway set a number of firsts for women in the Senate. In 1933, she was named chair of the Enrolled Bills Committee; the first woman ever to chair a Senate committee, she remained there until she left Congress in 1945. Caraway became the first woman to preside over the Senate, the first senior woman Senator (when Joe Robinson died in 1937), and the first woman to run a Senate hearing.

Most observers, including some of her supporters, believed Caraway would retire in 1939. But she upset expectations again by declaring her candidacy for the 1938 election. In the Democratic primary, Caraway faced two–term Representative John L. McClellan, a 42–year–old lawyer who declared, “Arkansas Needs Another Man in the Senate.” Senator Caraway ran on her record of supporting New Deal legislation to alleviate the economic hardships for the state’s largely agrarian economy.  She eked out a victory of 8,000 votes out of the 260,000 cast.

In her quest for a third term, Caraway finished fourth of the four candidates.  J. William Fulbright won the seat.  President Roosevelt and President Truman appointed her to positions in their governments. She continued her public service in those capacities until her death in 1950.

Tonight at the CALS Ron Robinson Theater – Streep and Hanks in Spielberg’s THE POST

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Image result for the post movieTonight’s movie at the CALS Ron Robinson Theater is The Post.  It is part of their movies of a Movement: The Civil Rights & Social Change Collection!

Steven Spielberg directs Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks in The Post, a thrilling drama about the unlikely partnership between The Washington Post’s Katharine Graham (Streep), the first female publisher of a major American newspaper, and editor Ben Bradlee (Hanks).

The pair race to catch up with The New York Times to expose a massive cover-up of government secrets that spanned three decades and four U.S. Presidents. The two must overcome their differences as they risk their careers – and their very freedom – to help bring long-buried truths to light.

The screening starts at 7pm. Admission is $5.

Frida Unbound program at Arkansas Arts Center tonight

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Nickolas Muray, American (Szeged, Hungary, 1892 – 1965, New York, New York), Frida Kahlo on White Bench, New York (2nd Edition), 1939, color carbon print, 19 x 14 ½ inches. Courtesy of Throckmorton Fine Art, New York, New York.

DePaul Art Museum Director Julie Rodrigues Widholm will examine Kahlo’s continued relevance to international artists who address the performance of gender, issues of national identity, the political body, among other themes. Frida Kahlo is one of the most famous artists in the world.

The program begins at 6pm tonight (March 14) in the Lecture Hall at the Arkansas Arts Center.

Her reputation and persona have grown immensely since her death in 1954, yet posthumously she has been turned into a stereotype of Latin American art. This predicament, along with her celebrity status, often overshadows the confrontational and boldly transgressive nature of her paintings, and ultimately undermines the revolutionary intent of her work.

At the time it was made, Kahlo’s unabashedly intimate portrayal of her physical and psychological experiences and her appropriation of Mexican folk art aesthetics challenged the bourgeois European mainstream. Her work subverted accepted notions of gender, sexuality, social class, and ethnicity, and was prophetic in anticipating the broader cultural concerns—postcolonialism, feminism, civil rights, multiculturalism, and globalization—that reached a crescendo in the 1960s and continue to be relevant today.

Following the lecture, guests are invited to view the galleries, shop in the Museum Shop or enjoy dinner at Watercolor in the Park.

Seating is limited. Tickets are required. Call 501-372-4000 for tickets.

Haydn’s CREATION MASS to be performed tonight by Arkansas Chamber Singers

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On Thursday, March 14, 2019, the Chamber Singers with members from Arkansas Symphony will perform one of the most important works of late classical choral/orchestral repertoire, Haydn’s magnificent “Creation Mass.”

The performance will take place at 7:30 pm at St. James United Methodist Church.  Tickets can be purchased in advance for $22 for adults and $15 for students.  Tickets at the door are $25 for adults and $18 for students.

Arkansas Chamber Singers is a performing arts organization dedicated to presenting and promoting the art of choral singing to audiences throughout the state. Since its founding in 1979, the group has developed a stellar reputation for its interpretation and delivery of a wide-ranging repertoire of choral literature.

There are presently 65 auditioned members, all of whom are volunteers who perform four to five times each year. The typical range of singers and audience members are from a 150 mile radius of Little Rock.  The Choir has performed in Conway, Hot Springs, Helena, Harrison, and Hot Springs. Singers and audiences hail from all across Arkansas including Arkadelphia, Austin, Bauxite, Benton, Clarksville, Greenbrier, Pine Bluff, Roland and Searcy.

The Chamber Singers are committed to continuing a tradition of excellence in all that is performed and working together to increase cultural understanding and creativity through a variety of compositions and performances.

Tonight – Oxford American welcomes Peter Bernstein, Larry Goldings & Bill Stewart Trio

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Image result for PETER BERNSTEIN, LARRY GOLDINGS & BILL STEWART TRIOThe Oxford American welcomes the Peter Bernstein, Larry Goldings & Bill Stewart Trio to Little Rock! This is the fifth and final show in their 2018-19 Jazz Series. Doors open at 6:00 PM, with dinner and drinks available for purchase at that time.

The series is made possible in part by presenting sponsor UCA College of Fine Arts & Communication.

Additional season partners include Stella Boyle Smith Trust, Chris & Jo Harkins, J. Mark & Christy Davis, EVO Business Environments, Downtown Little Rock Partnership, Stacy Hamilton of Pulaski Heights Realty, Margaret Ferguson Pope, Arkansas Arts Council, Department of Arkansas Heritage, Mosaic Templars Cultural Center, Capital Hotel, Arkansas Symphony Orchestra, Rosen Music Company, and Steinway Piano Gallery of Little Rock.

Tickets are $30 (General Admission), $44 (Reserved), and $46 (Premium Reserved). Please take a look at this very important ticketing and seating information before purchasing your tickets (view reserved seating chart). Full season ticket pricing and options are also available in a consolidated format, here.

Guitarist Peter Bernstein, organist Larry Goldings, and drummer Bill Stewart make up one of the best organ jazz trios of the past two decades. The respect the musicians have for one another comes through in the subtle and intricate manner of their musical conversation on stage. Indeed, you can hear them listening to each other. Drawing mainly on jazz standards, and a few original pieces, they re-imagine the organ jazz trio in a quiet, sensual, and grooving presentation.

All members of the Young Lion jazz movement at the close of the 20th century, and now all firmly established jazz stars, this group has been together for twenty-five years, making multiple recordings that display their distinctive sound, whether exploring the depths of jazz standards, or playing their original compositions. Jazz enthusiasts recognize the trio for charting new ground with hard-swinging, yet thoughtful music. Peter’s warm, feather-light touch and fluid improvisation with Larry Goldings’s warm hum, alongside Bill Stewart’s polyrhythmic and melodic focus, create a vivid combination of synergistic playing. With the trio’s extensive use of the music’s dynamic possibilities, the passion and joy of this amazingly versatile instrumental lineup is there for all to hear.