THEATER
‘In the Heights’
Actors Theatre of Little Rock stages Lin-Manuel Miranda’s pre-“Hamilton” Tony and Grammy Award-winning musical “In the Heights!,” 7:30 p.m. Wednesday-Friday and 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday through June 27 at Quapaw Quarter United Methodist Church, 1601 Louisiana St., Little Rock.
The production is “immersive,” meaning the performers will be making contact with some audience members throughout the show. Tickets are $35 for “immersive” seats, $30 for general admission, $25 for non-immersive; $5 more at the door. Visit actorstheatrelr.org/tickets.
Bluegrass a la Russe
TheatreSquared, 477 W. Spring St., Fayetteville, is putting “Eugene Onegin: A Bluegrass Musical,” a new adaptation of Alexander Pushkin’s drama by Obie Award-winner Sarah Gancher, onstage in its West Theatre, 7:30 p.m. Tuesday-Friday, 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday through June 28.
The theater has converted the space into an in-the-round “jam circle” — every seat within 20 feet of the stage — where 15 actor-musicians perform Gancher’s original bluegrass score while playing Pushkin’s doomed lovers Tanya and Eugene and other characters.
Gancher’s script transplants the setting to 1940s rural Arkansas, “with help from her own bluegrass background and family ties to Arkansas,” according to a news release.
Rachel Chavkin, a Tony Award-winner for “Hadestown” (and also the director of “Natasha, Pierre, & The Great Comet of 1812,”another musical based on a Russian classic, Leo Tolstoy’s “War and Peace”) directs. Jane Bruce plays Tanya, with Cory Jeacoma as Eugene, Sydney Shepherd as Olga and Adrian Blake Enscoe as Lensky.
Tickets are $25–$71; $15 for students and patrons under 30; $1 for recipients of SNAP benefits recipients through T2’s Lights Up! For Access program, supported by the Walmart Foundation. Visit theatre2.org.
DANCE
‘Riverdance 30’
“Riverdance 30 – The New Generation,” the 30th-anniversary production of the dance and music show, is onstage, 7 p.m. Tuesday and Wednesday and 1:30 p.m. Thursday at Fayetteville’s Walton Arts Center, 495 W. Dickson St. Tickets are $63.25-$97.75. Call (479) 443-5600 or visit waltonartscenter.org.
MUSIC
Scholarship winner
Chloe Rackley of Cheltenham, Pa., is the winner of the $1,000 2026 Peggy Gram Scholarship from the Top of the Rock Chorus, the Central Arkansas chapter of SingUnited International (formally Sweet Adelines International).
Rackley, a violinist, will be a sophomore music major at Wheaton College Conservatory in Wheaton, Ill., this fall. She has played with the Philadelphia Sinfonia Players and Wheaton College Orchestra and teaches using the Suzuki method, with plans to start an inner-city youth orchestra in the Philadelphia area.
The Top of the Rock’s scholarship fund, named for Gram, who spent more than 40 years as director of Top of the Rock Chorus, provides scholarships to women involved in music or vocal performance education.
THEATER
Theatrical ‘Diamonds’
Elijah Taylor, a student at Bentonville West High School, took Best Actor honors and Alma High School’s Cali Ferguson was named Best Actress at the Walton Arts Center’s Diamond Awards showcase and ceremony May 23.
Best Supporting Performance went to Sansa Meadows of Clarksville High School and Jenna Scott of Bentonville High School. Isaac Sides of Bentonville High School won Outstanding Vocal Performance; Andrew Bush of Alma High School and Karen Leite of Fort Smith Southside High School won for Outstanding Dance Performance; Sansa Meadows of Clarksville High School won for Outstanding Acting Performance; and Fort Smith Southside High School took the award for Best Ensemble Performance.
Industry professionals adjudicated 12 Northwest Arkansas high school theater programs that produced full-length musicals.
The Best Actress and Actor winners will compete in the Broadway League Foundation’s National High School Musical Theatre Awards, aka “The Jimmy Awards,” on June 22 in New York.
ETC.
Transcribe-a-Thons
Arkansas TV and the Arkansas Center for the Book, a program of the Arkansas State Library, are holding free, hands-on Transcribe-a-Thons across the state through June, the first of which takes place at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday at the Hempstead County Library, 500 S. Elm St., Hope.
The rest of the lineup:
◼️ 1 p.m. June 16, Garland County Public Library, 1427 Malvern Ave., Hot Springs
◼️ 10:30 a.m. June 27, Phillips County Library, 702 Porter St. No. 3142, Helena-West Helena
◼️ 10:30 a.m. June 30, Mahony Family Library (Auditorium), South Arkansas College, 300 Summit Ave., El Dorado.
The program for each will include clips of Ken Burns, Sarah Botstein and David Schmidt’s documentary “The American Revolution”; participants will help transcribe Revolutionary-era documents through the Library of Congress’ “By the People” project.
No prior experience is required; lunch or snacks will be provided. Volunteers will receive guidance on how to create and review transcriptions; transcription work will take place on computers — participants are welcome to take their own laptop or tablet; participants at the Hempstead County Library in Hope are encouraged to do so.
Those planning to attend events in Hot Springs and El Dorado are encouraged to register at arkansastv.gov/events; those planning to attend the Hope and Helena events should contact the libraries.
TICKETS
‘Hamilton’
Celebrity Attractions is selling single tickets — $49-$199 plus possible additional fees — for the touring production of “Hamilton” (book, music, and lyrics by Lin-Manuel Miranda), 7:30 p.m. Aug. 25-28, 2 and 7:30 p.m. Aug. 29 and 1 and 6:30 p.m. Aug. 30 at Little Rock’s Robinson Center Performance Hall, 426 W. Markham St. at Broadway. There is a limit of nine tickets per account. There will be a lottery for 40 $10 seats for each performance. Details will be announced closer to the engagement. Call (501) 244-8800 or visit CelebrityAttractions.com or Ticketmaster.com.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.arkansasonline.com ’
