Culinary Reviews
LV Recommends: Red Vespa
Brick walls, industrial piping and stamped metal bar backing greet you when you enter Red Vespa in Solon. The vibe of the place is chic, cozy rather than cramped, with an open kitchen that lends a comforting transparency to the inner workings of the pizzeria. The telltale aromas of tomato and mozzarella mingling with basil...
LV Recommends: Lebowski’s Bar & Grill
As a connoisseur of both stoner flicks and all vodka-related beverages I was thrilled to learn of a Big Lebowski-themed restaurant opening in Robins, Iowa (925 Robins Square Dr.). Advertised as a bar and grill, this establishment, opened in February by Shawn and Nola Bodensteiner, was practically begging me to come judge their White Russians (Caucasians, in the parlance of our times)...
Theatre Reviews
ICCT presents ‘Company,’ just in time for its 50th birthday
It’s a musical of dissonance; sharp sharps, swooping slides, pretty melodies sung at breakneck paces. Songs either feel as if they’re over too quickly or last far too long. This makes the music so appropriate to the subject matter that it’s haunting, hopeful and bittersweet. The downside of such a demanding and precise score, however, is that errors in lyrics and notes are glaring when missteps are made...
RHCR's ‘Five Women Wearing the Same Dress’ is wonderfully messy
Full disclosure, I don’t love the script of this play. Alan Ball is not my favorite playwright and I don’t typically enjoy the female characters he writes. … successful performances of it are heavily dependent on the women who inhabit the roles and the team in charge of putting it up. And every person involved in this production really did the work...
Foundry Performance Laboratory raises stakes with ‘The Seafarer’
I have always subscribed to the philosophy that theater has a responsibility to use the tools at its disposal to expose hypocrisy, contextualize truths and show people who they really are. There is no better way fiction has achieved this goal than with stories that include magic or the supernatural. People are just more honest when they’re making things up...
ICCT’s ‘Evil Dead: The Musical’ is one hell of a bizarre, wonderful show
ICCT’s production of George Reinblatt’s Evil Dead: The Musical is both bizarre and wonderful — in spades. After seeing it Friday night, I went home and watched all three original movies: Evil Dead, Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness. After this surprisingly swift marathon I have come to the undeniable conclusion...
Theatre Cedar Rapids sinks its teeth into ‘Dracula’
Though the recent resurgence of zombie hordes both on- and off-screen may be giving vampires (in general) a run for their money, no one character has been immortalized as often as Dracula. And if TCR’s ticket sales are any indication, this lone monster and his violent delights still have a powerful hold on our collective imaginations...
Exploring social contracts in RHCR’s ‘God of Carnage’
Taboos and our oft-unspoken understanding of, and adherence to, them are fascinating... one learns the key points from their parents: not to undress in public, for example. Over time, we start to intuit other social rules that are less clear cut, like not to tell other people how to parent their kids. But life’s best drama comes in the silent, tense moments just before, or after, someone breaks those rules...
‘The 24th Day’ is tense, dark, dangerous and lovely
“What reality?” you may by now be wondering. “What the heck happens in this play?” But I am not going to tell you. I would not dare spoil one single plot point of this story for you. I wouldn’t dare. I will, however, provide you with a few tantalizing tidbits and a carefully worded warning...
Pay attention: TCR’s ‘Assassins’ is timely and terrifying
...Politics and the noise of it has risen to a cacophony. What it means to watch the American dream die is the subject of every fight I’ve had with friends and relatives for much of the last year. This show, in that climate, is timely and terrifying. Despite my personal issues with the script, the talent and passion and vision put together by this team are appropriately unnerving...
Missing ‘A View From the Bridge’ at Riverside Theatre will haunt you
Every once in a great while I see a piece of theatre that reminds me why I wanted to be in theatre to begin with. The opening night performance of Arthur Miller’s A View From the Bridge at Riverside Theatre was just such a show — electric, inspiring, and devastating. This production gives meaning to the term dramatic tension and illustrates what live theatre is capable of...
Go down the ‘Rabbit Hole’ with Giving Tree Theater
...given the subject matter, this is an extremely difficult play to do well.
Giving Tree Theater in Marion absolutely nails it. Superbly cast, and delivered simply, elegantly, and honestly, this show cuts in moments you wouldn’t imagine, and has you laughing even when the words suggest such powerful grief you feel wicked for forgetting to weep...
Go forth, eastern Iowa, and baptize yourself in the ‘The Book of Mormon’
Book of Mormon follows Elder Price and Elder Cunningham, two young Mormons, as they go on their two year missionary trip to recruit locals into the Mormon Church. “Locals where?” you might ask. Uganda. That’s where. This story gives us nearly three hours (though it flies by) of absolutely laugh-out-loud, shake-your-head, tears-coming-out-of-your-eyes hilarity....