Sugar Creek Arts Festival Takes Art to the Streets of Normal

The Sugar Creek Arts Festival returns this weekend, with some 130  thirty exhibitors from across the nation bringing their ceramics, jewelry, paintings, photographs, sculptures and other artworks to the streets of Uptown Normal. This juried show of fine arts and crafts is accompanied by musical performances, vendors and workshops for children ages 4-16 who'd like to learn a little art themselves.

You can see details here of what artists will be where, what musical acts are playing when, and the specifics on those painting, drawing, ceramics and felting workshops for children.

Look for artists and their wares to be displayed on North Street between Fell and the roundabout, Beaufort Street between the roundabout and Linden, and about 3/4 of the roundabout itself. Food vendors will be found along that same route, with several at the roundabout. Click here for a map that puts everything in its place.

The overall hours of the Sugar Creek Arts Festival are 10 to 5 on Saturday and 11 to 4 on Sunday. There are several parking options, including free parking in the College Avenue parking deck and parking around Uptown Station.

The Sugar Creek Arts Festival is organized by the McLean County Arts Center and the Town of Normal.

Celebrating Independence Day the Holiday Spectacular Way

If you're acquainted with the December Holiday Spectacular, you know they put on a very good show, with a whole lot of performers singing and dancing up a storm. For the past several years, the Holiday Spectacular troupe had spread its holiday joy to July, too, with free "Celebrate America" concerts. This year's "Celebrate America" festivities are planned for Miller Park tonight and tomorrow night at 7 pm.

They're promising patriotic song favorites from the past as well as new material, with a cast of approximately 45 adults and kids, plus a special guest appearance from State Representative Dan Brady. You can see the whole cast list here to check on whether any of your neighbors or friends will be tapping, singing or showing their red-white-and-blue colors.

A little Holiday Spectacular 4th of July action from 2012

Keeping It Cool in July

July gets going early on the theatrical front, with the Illinois Shakespeare Festival offering a special one-woman show featuring Lori Adams as 19th Century Shakespearean actress Fanny Kemble tonight only.

Shame the Devil! An Audience with Fanny Kemble by Anne Ludlam takes the stage at Ewing Manor tonight at 7:30 pm, bringing you up close and personal with Fanny Kemble, an extraordinary woman who combined passions for acting and abolition with a tempestuous personal life.

The Normal Theater brings us a very interesting choice, a 2012 documentary called The Rep, from July 4 to 7. The film goes behind the scenes at movie theaters much like the Normal, where committed film lovers work to keep their art house cinemas alive, with the idea of bringing to life the world of repertory cinema "as a vibrant and culturally significant medium that needs to be preserved." I don't know about you, but I love that poster all by itself.

Illinois Shakespeare Festival mainstage shows The Comedy of Errors and Macbeth open in previews July 5 and 6, with the third show on this summer's schedule, Failure: A Love Story by Chicago playwright Philip Dawkins, previewing July 11. All three shows will officially open the following week, with Comedy bowing on the 12th, Macbeth wending its wicked way to the stage on the 13th and Failure showing up on the 14th. Options for special preshows, improv, Theatre for Young Audiences and backstage tours abound, so you're forewarned to check the complete calendar and the Festival homepage to make sure you get to see everything you're interested in. Tickets are available through the Illinois State University box office at 309-438-2535 and at Ticketmaster.

Heartland Theatre brings it New Plays from the Heartland project to the stage between July 11 and 14, with staged readings of Hear Me Now by Minnesota's Tim J. Brennan, Tangled Mess by Missouri's Stephen Peirick and Paper Cut to the Heart by Bloomington-Normal's own Terri Ryburn on Friday and Saturday, July 12 and 13, at 7:30 pm, and Sunday, July 14, at 2 pm. Mary Ruth Clarke, resident playwright at Chicago Dramatists Guild, will conduct a workshop with the winning playwrights earlier in the day and offer remarks to the public in an open forum at Heartland Theatre on July 11 at 7:30 pm. There is no charge for the latter event. For all the New Plays from the Heartland details, click here.

Elton John and Tim Rice's pop-rock musical Aida, as opposed to the opera by Verdi, opens at Community Players on July 12, with performances continuing through the 28th. The story is much the same, with Nubian princess Aida captured and held as a slave in Egypt, where she falls in love with military man Radames, although their love is threatened by Egyptian princess Amneris, who also fancies the captain. The Linda Woolverton/Robert Falls/David Henry Hwang book adds a fantasy endless-love framing device, but the basic story of doomed love is still there at the center. Alan Wilson directs Aida for Community Players, with a cast that includes Jennifer Rusk as Aida, Austin Travis as Radames, and Jennifer Stevens as Amneris. To see the complete cast as well as ticket information, click here.

July 12 is a popular date, with New Route Theatre choosing that night, as well, to present readings of original works by area writers. New Route's Tapestries III: Word Weavers, directed by Irene Taylor, will take place at Blair House in Normal, and include an open mic for audience members who'd like to share their own poetry or prose.

On July 15, Oprah Winfrey's OWN Network will begin airing the first 40 half-hour episodes of All My Children and One Life to Live produced for The Online Network. Many daytime favorites, like Erika Slezak, Robin Strasser, Kassie DePaiva, Tuc Watkins and Robert S. Woods of One Life and Debbi Morgan, Darnell Williams, Vincent Irizarry, Thorsten Kaye and Julia Barr on All My Kids, are appearing on these soap reboots, although several key players, like Susan Lucci, Erica Kane herself, and Michael E. Knight, who played Tad the Cad, are MIA. Still, I've been enjoying seeing old faves like Todd and Blair, and some of the newbies are quite good, including Eric Nelsen and Denyse Tontz as troubled teens AJ Chandler and Miranda Montgomery on AMC and Robert Gorrie and Corbin Bleu as a SORAS'd* Matthew Buchanan and his new pal Jeffrey on OLTL. Kelly Missal, who played Dani Manning on the old show as well as the new one, seems much improved these days, as well.

One of the best movies of the 60s -- one of the best movies ever -- Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb comes to Champaign's Art Theatre Co-op July 5, 6 and 11 at 10 pm, and July 7 at 11:30 am. Kubrick directed and co-wrote this dark, snarky comedy about a renegade general named Jack D. Ripper, beautifully played by Sterling Hayden, who goes bonkers (he's paranoid about losing "precious bodily fluids") and engineers a nuclear attack on the Soviets. In the wake of Ripper's solo declaration of war, President Merkin Muffley (Peter Sellars, in one of three roles, including Dr. Strangelove himself) scrambles to stop all-out nuclear war as General Buck Turgidson (George C. Scott) argues that nuking the Sovs may not be such a bad idea. Former Nazi scientist Dr. Strangelove, who has a mechanical arm and a wheelchair, is brought in to offer options, while Major "King" Kong (Slim Pickens) and Lieutenant Lothar Zogg (James Earl Jones) man the B-52 bomber speeding towards Soviet targets. Remember -- there's no fighting in the War Room!

The second Secret Garden of the summer begins July 26 at Miller Park, when the Missoula Childrens' Theatre brings the 1991 Broadway musical to Miller Park for the first of four performances. Lucy Simon wrote the music and playwright Marsha Norman did the book and lyrics for this stage adaptation of the classic childrens' novel about an orphan girl sent from India to the English countryside to live with her uncle. Click here for all the details on Miller Park Summer Theatre.

*SORAS refers to Soap Opera Rapid Aging Symdrome, a common technique used on daytime dramas to turn toddlers into hunky teens and 20-somethings overnight to make them more useful in ongoing plotlines.

Verdi's AIDA from MIO Today at 3

The Midwest Institute of Opera will offer a concert version of Verdi's Aida this afternoon at 3 pm at the Illinois State University Center for the Performing Arts.

Verdi's four-act opera about a pair of ill-fated lovers in ancient Egypt has been an audience favorite since its first performance in 1871. Over the years, Aida has seen notable performances by sopranos Teresa Stolz, Maria Callas, Renata Tebaldi, Leontyne Price and Montserrrat Caballé as Aida; tenors Richard Tucker, Jussi Björling, Jon Vickers and Placido Domingo as her lover Radames; and conductors like Arturo Toscanini, Herbert von Karajan, Georg Solti and Zubin Mehta with the baton.

For the Midwest Institute of Opera, Cara Chowing conducts, with soprano Tracy Marie Koch in the role of Aida; tenor Tod Kowallis as her Radames; mezzo soprano Allison Robertson as Amneris, the daughter of the Egyptian king and a thorn in the Aida/Radames romance; baritone John M. Koch as Amonasro, Aida's father; bass baritone Anthony Gullo as high priest Ramfis, and bass Richard Schacht as the Egyptian king. Pianist Byul Nim La will accompany this concert staging of the opera.

The MIO version of Aida will be sung in Italian with English supertitles. Tickets are $10 and are available at the door. You may also call the ISU CPA Box Office at 309-438-2535 an hour prior to the show. Note that tickets purchased at the door must be paid for in cash.

Another Don't Miss -- NOTORIOUS -- on TCM at Midnight

The programmers at Turner Classic Movies have certainly had my number this month, what with all the film noir and a focus on screenwriter Donald Ogden Stewart, who specialized in romantic comedy.

Last week, they aired Holiday, the Cary Grant/Katharine Hepburn comedy that sits at the top of my all-time favorite list. And now, tonight, we get Notorious, not the B.I.G.one, but a 1946 suspense classic directed by Alfred Hitchcock, starring Ingrid Bergman as a bad girl, one Alicia Huberman, and Cary Grant as the dark and dangerous spy who's keeping an eye on her. He's keeping a few other things on her, too, and it's that combination of seduction, betrayal and danger that makes Notorious so delicious.

Cary Grant may have created the perfect screen hero using elegance and charm, intelligence and mischief, to make an indelible mark on film. Notorious shows off his dark side. And that is a very good side for Mr. Grant.

Even aside from Grant's drop-dead gorgeous, drop-dead sardonic spy, there's a lot to love about Notorious. Ingrid Bergman is a wonderful partner for him. He's all sharp edges, while she's all soft doubt and sensuality. You believe in the attraction as well as the doubts. Hitchcock makes sure of that.

The plot sets her up as the daughter of a Nazi convicted of treason to the United States in a very public trial. So she's the notorious one, since everyone suspects her of aiding and abetting Dad. Plus she's been known to drink and party too much, making her reputation even worse. Enter Cary Grant as Devlin, the cynical spy who woos her long enough to get her to go after one of Dad's former compatriots, now living the good life in Brazil.

That compatriot is Alexander Sebastian, a small, seemingly sweet man who has a battle-ax of a mother and some very nasty friends. The elegant and urbane Claude Rains turns Sebastian into one of Hitchcock's best villains, someone who is warm and sympathetic, clearly smitten with Bergman's Alicia, even as he plots with Nazis on the side.

The romantic complication for Devlin and Alicia is that it's his job to get her to seduce Sebastian, and to clear her name from her father's evil deeds, she has to do it, even though the two are really in love with each other. That is a pretty dandy conflict as conflicts go.

So Alicia goes through with it, playing on Sebastian's major crush to get herself into his life and his household. And then the games really begin, building to a swanky party where she has to steal a key to the champagne cellar, trade the key to Dev right under Sebastian's nose, get into the wine cellar to find the hidden uranium (I'm not making this up!) and get back to the party before anyone is the wiser. Uranium! Poison! Champagne! Jealousy! Jeopardy!

It's really, really good stuff.

I cannot recommend Notorious highly enough. It's just that good. And it begins tonight at midnight (Central time) on Turner Classic Movies.

Happy Birthday YOUNG AT HEARTLAND!

If it's June, it must be time for the Young at Heartland Summer Showcase! This is the tenth anniversary of the founding of Heartland Theatre's senior acting troupe, and they're celebrating that milestone by performing some of their favorite scenes from past shows. And that includes some scenes written by Young at Heartland members themselves. This year's Showcase features 21 actors in eleven short scenes, performed on stage at Heartland Theatre on Friday, June 28, at 1 pm.

The gift of Young at Heartland keeps on giving.

Young at Heartland actors prepare and workshop their scenes during two-month class sessions held with a special instructor every Spring and Fall. This year, recent ISU masters degree recipient Sarah Salazar headed up the classes, assisted by Misti Crossland, who filled that function last year. Founder and Program Director Ann B. White has once again shepherded the troupe in class and out, as they took their act on the road to the senior centers, churches and civic groups who keep their schedule full.

The Summer Showcase gives Young at Heartland performers an opportunity to show the general public what they've been working on. And it's always a popular event. Reservations are not taken, as it is purely first-come, first-served seating. That means that when the doors open at 12:40 pm, you are advised to be there! Admission is free, although donations are recommended.

For more information on Heartland Theatre or the Young at Heartland program, click the links under their names or call 309-452-870. The entire summer schedule is available here.

Everybody Ought to Have DEVIOUS MAIDS

At almost the same moment the series Desperate Housewives locked its doors, creator Marc Cherry was in the news for a pilot he was pitching to ABC. It was called Devious Maids and it was based on a Mexican TV series that was itself inspired by Desperate Housewives. But ABC passed on the Maids pitch the day after Desperate Housewives aired its finale. Lucky for Mr. Cherry and for fans of his Housewives, Lifetime picked it up a few weeks later, and they're starting it tomorrow as a bit of tasty summer entertainment.

Instead of focusing on four upper middle-class women -- one blonde, one redhead, and two brunettes, including one Latina -- all living on the same suburban street, as Desperate Housewives did, Maids looks at five Latina women, the domestic help of the very rich in Los Angeles. There's the same quirky pop style you'll recognize from Housewives, and both series begin with a death. In Housewives, it was the suicide of a member of the inner circle that jumpstarted the action. In Maids, it's the murder of a pretty, unhappy servant named Flora. But the bright colors, the ironic tone, the notion that underneath the patina of paradise lie some very dark secrets...

It all looks very Desperate for these Devious Maids. Without a narrator, however. In the former, the dead lady gave us voice-overs to cue the current action. This time out, we're on our own with beautiful, scheming Carmen (Roselyn Sanchez), working for a superstar recording artist and trying to catch his eye and her own train to stardom; sweet Rosie (Dania Ramirez), trying desperately to get her son to America; cynical Zoila (Judy Reyes), who works for a neurotic socialite (played by Susan Lucci) who'd be perfect for a Real Housewives show; Zoila's daughter Valentina (Edy Ganem), who has a thing for the boss's son; and Marisol (Ana Ortiz), who has ulterior motives for taking the maid gig.

The various heads of households include different kinds of crazy, with a whole lot of narcissism and privilege front and center. Butterfly (and maid) collector Adrian Powell (Tom Irwin) and his nutball wife Evelyn (Rebecca Wisocky) lead the parade -- it was their maid who was knifed during a dinner party -- with a lawyer (Brett Cullen) and his trophy wife (Brianna Brown) and a soap star (Grant Show) married to a very ambitious actress (Mariana Klaveno) rounding out the list of suspects. Er, employers.

I enjoyed the first episode, which is available at Lifetime, the Internet Movie Database and Hulu, if you'd care to take a look before the official debut tomorrow. The lead players are certainly attractive, and it helps that I recognize (and like) most of them from their previous work. Sanchez is as stunning as she was on Without a Trace, it's nice to see Reyes again since Scrubs was canceled, Ortiz was one of the best things about Ugly Betty, and Susan Lucci needs no introduction to anyone who ever saw All My Children. Tom Irwin, meanwhile, is a Peoria native and ISU alum, Matt Cedeno, who plays superstar Alejandro Rubio, the one Sanchez's Carmen is trying to hook, came from Days of Our Lives, and Melinda Page Hamilton, who has an odd role as a Slavic taskmaster running Rubio's household, had a memorable turn as the first Mrs. Draper on Mad Men. Valerie Mahaffey, who sticks in my mind for her role as the bad date who was into papier-mâché (with over-the-top French pronunciation) on Seinfeld, also pops up in the pilot as an unwelcome first wife.

And there's also Rebecca Wisocky, someone I remember from Actors Theatre of Louisville's Humana Festival of New American Plays, as the looniest tune in a loony symphony. Not sure how her character arc is going to turn out. I may be tired of her wild eyes and over-the-top insanity very quickly. Okay, I'm already tired of it. So maybe she can be the next knifing victim.

Devious Maids airs Sunday nights at 9 Central on Lifetime. There are 13 episodes in this initial order, and if the ratings are good, there may be more. I'm sort of torn -- it would be nice to tie up all the plotlines they've started in those 13 and keep it fresh, plus I'd like to see Susan Lucci back on All My Children and the stereotype of all the crazy, selfish beyotches with money is tiresome -- but, on the other hand, it is fun, and it's giving work to some talented actresses who deserve to be seen. I suggest you tune in for the premiere (or sneak-peek it at one of the links above, if you'll be glued to the Mad Men finale like me) and make up your own mind. If you liked Desperate Housewives, this may just be your cup of tea. With un poco de arsénico on the side.